In a workshop held in Asharqia Chamber yesterday, Major General al-Maliki stressed the need to strengthen local content in the associated military industries.
Major General Engineer Attiyah bin Saleh al-Malki, the Director General of the General Directorate of Local Manufacturing at the Ministry of Defense, and the Chairman of the Preparatory Committee for the Armed Forces Exhibition (AFD 2018), pointed out that the private industrial sector has promising investment opportunities in the field of military and civilian accompanying industries. This plan will promote local content in production and manpower, and support the Kingdom Vision of 2030.
In a workshop hosted by the Industrial Committee of Asharqia Chamber on Sunday (January 28, 2018), Al-Maliki said that there are economic and strategic motives that push us to support the local industrialization of the armed forces. These motives would include reducing the rising costs of the maintenance and repair requirements of the systems, which increase the real cost exponentially, shorten the time, prevent the monopoly of foreign sources, and find alternative local sources that shorten the time and meet the required quality and specifications at lower prices. In addition, it includes the goal of supporting local content and integrated work between national factories, and recycling the financial resources in the local markets, all of which achieve national security and support the Kingdom's vision of 2030.
He emphasized that the support of the national industry means providing job opportunities for Saudi youth in important fields such as technical and engineering jobs, and enhancing local content in all military systems.
He also pointed out that the presence of these goals accelerated the establishment of the General Directorate to Support the Local Manufacturing, which would be directly linked to His Highness the Crown Prince of Defense. Its mission would be to localize the manufacture of spare parts and equipment by developing a strategy of cooperation between the armed forces and the public and private sectors and follow-up implementation.
Major General al-Maliki said that we are not talking about the manufacture of aircraft, missile and armored industries, these industries have other parties concerned; but we are now talking about complementary industries to build these systems and maintain their readiness. The industry would include spare parts that can be manufactured domestically (the readiness of the aircraft, , missile, and armor depend on this kind of industry), or high-consumption and high-cost pieces that can be made locally, or the pieces purchased from abroad and stopped manufacturing there, or parts that need to be developed and improved in product, and all high-tech pieces that can be produced locally. It promotes the transfer and localization of technology, as well as the local product can be followed up, modified, guaranteed and processed faster than the imported product.
Major General al-Maliki gave a number of samples and differences in prices between the pieces were produced locally at a cost of 50 thousand riyals, and cost the state about one million riyals if imported from abroad, despite the existence of time and quality differences calculated for the domestic product. In fact, a piece costing 33 thousand riyals was produced locally at a cost of 127 riyals only, and some pieces lasted from 4 years until some systems came and disrupted and were produced locally in less than a year.
He pointed to the results of domestic manufacturing in the past years, as no more than 182 products were manufactured in 2010. However, "we have reached 5427 items in the last year 2017, we have been producing more than 65 million pieces of these varieties in more than 12 local projects." It added that some international companies are starting to rely on Saudi products in their systems in the international markets.
Maliki added that this approach has enabled the private sector to support the local military systems especially after the establishment of a public administration. The public administration's main goals are to support the national industrialization of the Ministry of Defense, to establish a mechanism of action from the selection of the category and its rehabilitation and conversion to the local source, and the adoption of financial provisions for the domestic manufacture of the armed forces. Also, it includes the establishment of a number of exhibitions of the armed forces, the issuance of 3 evidence of investment opportunities, the establishment of a database of materials manufactured or required to manufacture, and the establishment of several workshops for these purposes.
He asked on the private sector to focus on quality in local products, compete with imported products at prices and on time of supply, work with the Ministry of Defense and local partners to transfer technology, and contribute with research centers in universities and companies to develop local products.
He said, "if we produced the research, and the factory would turn it into a product, and then another plant would benefit from that product, so the government agency beneficiary and relied on that product. Only then, the cycle would be completed that is to strengthen the local content in production and manpower."
He stressed the need for providing codes for national products, which include product coding, factory coding. Thus this idea would give the national industry its identity, as "we look for one number for all our national factories where the product is recognized as a Saudi product."
In this regard, Major-General al-Maliki emphasized the need to participate in the exhibitions of the armed forces to show products, or visit and see the pieces to be manufactured. There are 55 investment areas and about 80 thousand manufacturing opportunities in the exhibitions.
He pointed out that the Ministry communicates with government agencies and major companies to standardize procedures and exchange experiences, and to communicate with research institutions and laboratories. In addition, the Ministry communicates with international companies to deal with the use of the national products by showing the capabilities and potential of local factories.
