JEDDAH, 2 October 2006 — Businessmen in the Saudi pharmaceutical industry have expressed concern about their inability to employ qualified Saudi pharmacists and sales assistants. According to industry sources, the main reason behind this slow move in Saudization are low salaries, long working hours and an abundance of cheap foreign workers.
Experts estimate that there are more than 20,000 men and women from neighboring countries working in the Saudi pharmaceutical industry. They say there are thousands of pharmacies across the Kingdom that could potentially provide employment to thousands of Saudis.
Dr. Ateeq Al-Ghamdi, dean of the Society College in Jeddah, told Arab News, “The effort to Saudize the pharmaceutical industry is necessary and the demand of the current era. The academic and training institutions have a greater responsibility to prepare trained Saudis to replace foreigners in this business. This will benefit the country economically and will help in developing the Kingdom.”
Statisticians estimate that the number of Saudi pharmacists entering the industry will not be more than 250 over the next three years. It is expected that in 1445 AH there will be a total of 12,500 Saudis working in the industry. This number highlights the need to establish more pharmaceutical colleges in the country.
In the same context, the Al-Nahdi pharmacy group has signed an agreement to support pharmaceutical students at the Society College. The general manager of the Al-Nahdi group, Bandar Hamoh, signed the agreement with Dr. Al-Ghamdi in the presence of Hisham Linjawi, manager of the Human Development Fund in the Makkah region.
Hamoh said, “Based on this agreement, the Al-Nahdi pharmacy group will train Saudi graduates at its pharmacies and then employ them. The market is in urgent need of Saudi graduates in both the public and private sectors.”
He added that male and female students should not be under the impression that the job is limited to the sale of medicines. “This view is wrong because pharmacists help in curing patients and are more aware of effects and side-effects of medicines,” he added.
The authorities have responded to the demand by establishing specialized pharmacy colleges with an aim of increasing the number of Saudis working in the field. They also aim to reduce the number of foreign workers in the Kingdom, put an end to the problem of selling dangerous medicines on the black market and also prevent the smuggling of these medicines into the Kingdom.
The pharmaceutical industry in Saudi Arabia is considered the biggest in the Middle East.
According to the Health Ministry, the Kingdom’s pharmaceutical market constitutes over 23 percent of the Middle East pharmaceutical market, which is estimated to be worth $6.5 billion a year. This has driven the concerned authorities to increase their absorbed ability in the medical and pharmaceutical colleges to ease the pressure on the government by providing more jobs in the coming years that coincide with the population growth.
The employment offices around the Kingdom are calling for more support from the private sector by increasing the salaries of Saudis in the pharmaceutical industry to attract more of them.
