Oman’s development story over the past five decades is, by any reasonable measure, a remarkable one. A country that in 1970 had fewer than ten kilometres of paved road has built a modern state with world-class ports, a national airport network, expanding universities and a human development trajectory that has outpaced most of its income peers. Oil revenues funded the transformation; government expenditure provided the stimulus; and a culture of stability and diplomatic balance gave the Sultanate of Oman a distinctive position in a volatile region.
Yet the model that delivered this progress is now exhausted. Hydrocarbons still account for roughly 65 per cent of export receipts, 74 per cent of government revenue and about 30 per cent of GDP. Real growth between 2021 and 2024 averaged approximately 3.4 per cent — well below the 5 per cent annual target set by Oman Vision 2040. The private sector remains heavily reliant on government contracts, with SMEs constituting less than 20 per cent of the country’s economic units. Exports stand at only one-third of their estimated potential and foreign direct investment has significant room for expansion.
These are not failures of ambition. Oman Vision 2040, articulated under His Majesty Sultan Haitham bin Tarik, is among the most clearly structured national strategies in the Gulf. Its four pillars encompass twelve national priorities with measurable KPIs. The targets are explicit: non-oil activities contributing more than 90 per cent of GDP, FDI reaching 10 per cent of GDP and sustained 5 per cent annual growth.
The gap between these ambitions and current reality is precisely where the opportunity lies — and why this particular decade, 2026 to 2035, matters more than any period since the Omani Renaissance began. Three forces are converging to create what I believe is an unprecedented window.
First, the global landscape is being redrawn. Geopolitical realignment, friend-shoring pressures and the continuing disruption of established trade corridors are forcing multinational firms to rethink where they manufacture, store and route goods. The recent regional tensions have only accelerated this calculus. Oman’s Arabian Sea ports — Duqm, Salalah and Sohar — sit outside the Strait of Hormuz chokepoint. Its diplomatic neutrality, tested repeatedly and held firm, makes it one of the few jurisdictions in the region where political usability and operational continuity converge. When combined with a free trade agreement with the United States, a comprehensive economic partnership with India and GCC common market access, Oman offers duty-free reach to more than two billion consumers. That is not a talking point. It is a structural competitive advantage that did not exist a decade ago.
Second, the 11th Five-Year Development Plan, launching in 2026, marks the transition from planning to execution. If the 10th Plan was about effective management of development, the 11th is explicitly about sustainable economic development — the phase where diversification targets must translate into factory floors, export manifests and quality jobs. National programmes such as Tanfeedh for economic diversification and Nazdaher for investment promotion provide the institutional architecture. The sectors targeted — manufacturing, logistics, mining, green energy, tourism and technology — are grounded in Oman’s demonstrated comparative advantages: competitive gas pricing among the lowest in the region, vast mineral resources, a Net Zero 2050 commitment with a 60 per cent renewable target by 2034 and industrial land at Duqm and Salalah priced well below equivalent sites in the UAE or Saudi Arabia.
Third and most critically, the competition is not waiting. Saudi Arabia is deploying over a trillion dollars across megaprojects and industrial cities. The UAE continues to accelerate FDI attraction with aggressive AI and innovation strategies. Qatar and Bahrain are carving out specialised niches. For Oman, the window of advantage — geographic, diplomatic and cost-based — is open, but it will not stay open indefinitely. The speed and consistency of execution will now matter as much as the quality of strategy.
What does all of this demand from Omani entrepreneurs and business leaders? In a word: a paradigm shift — a fundamental change in thinking and acting that results from challenging one’s underlying assumptions. The old paradigm of government-dependent, domestically oriented, import-and-distribute enterprise cannot deliver the growth that Oman Vision 2040 requires. The new paradigm demands that Omani businesses think globally, anchor technology, attract foreign investment as strategic partners, build and produce rather than merely trade, diversify across sectors, develop skilled national talent and move up the value chain from raw materials to finished goods exported to regional and global markets.
This is not a comfortable message. It requires abandoning familiar patterns and accepting short-term discomfort for long-term prosperity. A business in Muscat must ask not only how to serve the domestic market, but how to manufacture in Oman and sell to India, Africa and the GCC. Family business groups must professionalise governance, embrace partnerships with international investors and build capabilities that did not exist in their portfolios five years ago. Young Omani entrepreneurs must think in terms of export corridors, not just local customer bases.
The infrastructure is ready. The policy framework is in place. The trade agreements are signed. The competitive energy is available. The strategic location is a gift of geography no competitor can replicate. What remains is the most difficult ingredient: the collective willingness to change how we think, how we build and how we grow.
The states that will define the post-disruption economic order in the Gulf are not those that merely endured the turbulence. They are those that used it to redesign their position. Oman still has that opportunity. But it belongs to this decade — and to those with the courage to seize it.
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