The Ministry of Labor has rejected claims that its decisions to back a two-day weekend for private firms and increasing Saudization quotas across industries, has caused prices to rise.

A ministry source said recently that government does not plan to rescind any of its new laws and regulations aimed at transforming the country’s labor market.

“These decisions follow the ministry conducting extensive studies of the Saudi labor market and its needs,” the source said.

This response comes in the wake of businesspeople at the Riyadh Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Council of Saudi Chambers claiming that health service charges would increase by up to 30 percent because of the ministry’s decisions.

The source said that the ministry is not responsible for keeping prices in check. “This is the task of the ministries that granted the licenses, either the Ministry of Health or the Ministry of Commerce.”

He said the role of the Labor Ministry is to regulate the market, create jobs and reduce unemployment in the country.

Khaled Al-Subaie, a member of the Riyadh chamber, recently claimed that several medical centers closed down, while others either plan to, or have already increased their fees to make up for the losses caused by the labor ministry’s decisions.

Experts in the construction sector have also estimated that prices have risen by 50 percent for contractors and workers since the Labor Ministry’s decisions. Some car maintenance workshops also raised their prices, they said.

Meanwhile, the Labor Ministry recently adjusted the Saudization quotas for the health sector, to bring small and medium enterprises in line with large facilities. The high Green Zone will include facilities achieving a Saudization ratio of 33 to 34 percent, the medium Green Zone with 29 to 32 percent, and the low Green Zone from 25 to 28 percent.

In addition, the ministry intends to calculate Saudization quotas according to a system of accumulation instead of the old one which relied on the number of Saudi workers at a firm divided by the total number of workers.

The new decision takes into account recruitment or resignations within a certain time-period at companies. The calculations will be based on the databases of the Ministry of Interior and General Organization for Social Insurance (GOSI) over the past seven months.