Oman’s airport cities to unlock new investment opportunities

MUSCAT, JULY 9

Plans are afoot to offer land available around airports in the Sultanate of Oman for investment and development to serve as new catalysts for socioeconomic growth, a key official has revealed.

Aimen bin Ahmed al Hosni, CEO – Oman Airports Group, said the initiative will help unlock new synergies for investment linked to their proximity to well-established seaports and logistics infrastructure.

“We have a new initiative to open up real estate development areas around the airports (similar to) airport cities and city airports. What we are actually trying to do is build the city around all the airports that we have, to complement – and not compete – the city. The airports that we have selected in Oman (for this initiative) are near the seaports which we hope to leverage and complement each other to support sea-air cargo and vice versa.”

Speaking at a key conference on Wednesday,¬¬¬ hosted by Bloomberg on the theme, ‘Foreign Direct Investment: Scaling New Heights’, Al Hosni said the presence of seaports within easy proximity of airports in Suhar, Salalah and Duqm boded well for the establishment of airport city developments. He credited the “wise vision” of Oman’s planning authorities for introducing this airport-seaport combination in major cities, thereby creating a “competitive advantage” that the aviation sector now seeks to exploit.

Last year, Royal Decree 10/2022 promulgated a law establishing free zone developments at Muscat, Suhar and Salalah airports under the overall administrative auspices of the Public Authority for Special Economic Zones and Free Zones. Earlier this week, state-owned end-to-end transport and logistics group Asyad was granted a 50-year extension of its concession to operate the Free Zone at Muscat International Airport.

In his talk, Al Hosni also underlined the importance of Oman’s airports as drivers of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) inflows. More than $3 billion has been invested in the development of Oman’s airport infrastructure, he said.

“We have state-of-the-art buildings with Code F runways at all seven airports operated by Oman Airports. These investments by the government give Oman added competitiveness and connectivity with the rest of the world. And we make sure we welcome our guests in the best manner,” stated.

Participating in the panel discussion alongside Al Hosni were Hashil al Mahrouqi, CEO – Omran Group, and Abdulrehman Nasser, Chief Commercial Officer – Oman Air.