JEDDAH, 2 May 2006 — Crown Prince Sultan has announced that the Kingdom’s Saudization drive was going ahead in the right direction. He commended the Labor Ministry, technical institutes and private companies for their efforts in providing training and employment to thousands of young Saudis.
Prince Sultan was talking to reporters after attending a graduation ceremony at Al-Salam Aircraft Company in Riyadh on Sunday.
“Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah gives top priority to training young Saudis to take up jobs in various sectors,” the Saudi Press Agency quoted the crown prince as saying.
Prince Sultan said the Kingdom’s prestigious Economic Offset Program resulted in the establishment of 27 companies with the cooperation of Saudi private sector and foreign firms. A number of new projects will be carried out shortly under this program to strengthen the economy, he added.
“The offset program was instrumental in setting up a number of strategic and advanced industries in aviation, space science, electronics and engineering systems,” Sultan said, adding that they created a large number of jobs for Saudis. “We are proud to see that some foreign countries send their aircraft to the Kingdom for maintenance,” he said.
“We’ll soon witness graduation of new batches of Saudis trained on assembling aircraft and specialized in aircraft industry,” he pointed out.
As many as 167 Saudi trainees graduated on Sunday from the company, which is specialized in repair, maintenance and overhaul of commercial, military and civilian aircraft.
The graduates had attended training programs held by the company such as technical program for the maintenance of aircraft bodies, mechanical program for the maintenance of F-15 planes, training program for engineering graduates and training program for administrative assistants.
Prince Sultan visited an exhibition staged on the occasion and inspected some aircraft parts manufactured at the company. He also inspected facilities for upgrading planes to increase their durability. The company has so far upgraded 55 aircraft.
Prince Faisal ibn Farhan, acting chairman of Al-Salam Aircraft Company, said the company was making headways to achieve the goals set by the government. He said he saw a bright future for the Kingdom’s aviation industry.
“Our company is now meeting the Kingdom’s needs in aircraft maintenance for civilian and military planes in terms of making modification and modernization.
“We have been successful in modernizing 124 military aircraft including Tornado and F-15 fighters,” he explained.
Of a total of 134 commercial planes maintained by the company, 52 were from abroad. “This reflects the company’s competitiveness and its role in boosting national economy,” he added.
Al-Salam provides technical support for Saudi Air Force projects.
