The Arab States

Abstract

IntroductIon The Arab world stretches from the Indian Ocean in the East to the Atlantic Ocean in the West. The 20 Arab countries occupy the Southern and Eastern shores of the Mediterranean and enclose the Red sea. It is an area of historical importance, as it is the birthplace of the world’s three Abrahamic religions. For centuries, the region was a hub of groundbreaking science. It has contemporary strategic importance owing to its location and a wealth of subterranean natural resources, essentially in the form of oil and natural gas – 32% of the world’s known natural gas reserves are to be found in the region – as well as phosphate: Morocco alone possesses more than half of the world’s reserves. The region encompasses remarkable cultural similarities as well as highly distinct political and economic systems with a heterogeneous social fabric. Its peoples share a commonality of language, history and religion but their societies are at variance in terms of natural wealth, governance, currency, traditions and socioeconomic systems. The period since the UNESCO Science Report 2005 appeared has been one of mixed fortunes for Arab countries. The region has witnessed continuing political upheaval and military conflict in the Gaza and the West Bank, Iraq, Lebanon, and Sudan. The oil-exporting Arab states of Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have enjoyed a short-lived downpour of revenue resulting from the hike in international oil prices to a peak of more than US$140 a barrel in July 2008. Conversely, oil-importing countries such as Jordan, Tunisia and Morocco have faced fiscal difficulties due to their mounting national energy bills, a situation compounded by the associated rise in the cost of imported food commodities. The subsequent plummet in oil prices, which fell to about US$40 by the end of 2008 before recovering slightly in 2009, has brought this exceptional situation to an end. It has also highlighted the volatility of oil prices and the need for Arab oil-exporting countries to diversify their economies in future. Notwithstanding these difficulties, the same period also witnessed renewed interest on the part of many Arab countries in reinvigorating science and technology (S&T) and higher education, with the launch of a number of top-down initiatives to support education and research. Some of these will be highlighted in tentsapproved plans to allocate more resources to research and development (R&D) among them Egypt, Tunisia and Qatar. The current global economic recession may not affect Arab states in the immediate term, as the banking sector in the majority of Arab states is highly regulated and only loosely linked to international money markets. However, the economic fallout will ultimately be felt by all, negatively affecting foreign direct investment flowing into Arab countries and real estate markets. This will cause a slowdown in economic growth and a rise in unemployment in the region. Arab countries reliant on exporting goods and services to the USA and European Union (EU) and those that normally receive aid from these quarters may suffer. Even before the economic crisis emerged in the last quarter of 2008, unemployment in the Arab world was higher than in any other part of the world, at around 12%. Young job-seekers constitute over 40% of the region’s unemployed. Despite the international economic uncertainty, Arab states will have no choice but to stimulate science, technology and innovation (STI), together with the education sector, if only to overcome some lingering problems like food, water and energy insecurity. Arab countries can also learn from the remarkable socio-economic progress of countries such as Brazil, China, India, Malaysia and Mexico, due in part to S&T.