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FACTS & STATS

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FACTS & STATS
  • Region Economic Statistics
    GDP at current prices (2008): $2.303 trillion
    GDP growth rate (2008): 3.51%
    Exports (2008): US $1.194 trillion, Growth Rate: -0.52%
    Imports (2008): US $885 billion, Growth Rate : -1.62%

    More Facts

  • Population Statistics
    The Middle East has a total estimated population of around 1.231 billion people.
    There are a total of 20 countries located in Middle East
  • Trade and Commerce Statistics
    Exports remained in the positive territory for the seventh successive month, but the 35 per cent growth in shipments in May was lower than that in the same month last year.
    Exports in May were worth $16.1 billion against $12 billion in May 2009. Following the global financial crisis, exports had fallen for 13 consecutive months, before turning positive in November 2009.

    More Facts

  • Top 10 in Middle East
    Biggest Cities:
    1. Karachi, Pakistan - 11,774,000
    2. Dhaka, Bangladesh - 10,979,000
    3. Istanbul, Turkey - 9,413,000
    4. Tehrãn, Iran - 7,380,000
    5. Lahore, Pakistan - 6,030,000
    6. Baghdãd, Iraq - 4,796,000…

    More Facts

  • Mobile Facts in Middle East
    MoneyGram International (NYSE:MGI), a leading global money transfer company, and National Bank of Abu Dhabi (NBAD), a leading bank in the UAE, today announced a strategic agreement that will make international money transfer services via mobile phones available for the first time to the bank's customers all over the UAE.
    MEF opens Middle East hub

    More Facts

  • Internet in Middle East
    UAE Internet Users Concerned About Internet Privacy
    New research from Real Opinions shows that 60% of UAE Internet users favour behavioural targeting for customised advertising and Internet content, whilst 76% said their searches for products and visits to websites should never be monitored unless they have given express permission to do so beforehand.

    More Facts

Basic Economic Statistics:
  • GDP at current prices (2008): $2.303 trillion
  • GDP growth rate (2008): 3.51%
  • Exports (2008): US $1.194 trillion, Growth Rate: -0.52%
  • Imports (2008): US $885 billion, Growth Rate : -1.62%
  • Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) (2008-2009): $94.663 billion
  • Middle East Market Value (2008-2009): $11.929 trillion
Population Statistics:
  • Africa has a total population of around 999 million people.
  • There are a total of 53 countries in Africa.
  • The largest population in SSA is 131.5 million (Nigeria); the smallest is Seychelles (0.1 million).
  • More than 35% of Africans live in sustained-growth economies that have grown at more than 4% a year for ten years.
  • Thirty three percent of children who start first grade reaches grade five in Chad; in Mauritius 97% reach fifth grade. (MDG 2).
  • South Africa has the most advanced economy on the African continent. Since1994, particularly, the country's economy has grown rapidly. Its geographical position provides an ideal gateway to Sub-Saharan Africa.
  • In 2008 there were a total of 1445 listed domestic companies in Africa.
Trade and Commerce Statistics:
  • Exports remained in the positive territory for the seventh successive month, but the 35 per cent growth in shipments in May was lower than that in the same month last year.
  • Exports in May were worth $16.1 billion against $12 billion in May 2009. Following the global financial crisis, exports had fallen for 13 consecutive months, before turning positive in November 2009.
  • The other worrying factor is that the rupee has appreciated by over 14 per cent against the Euro since January 2010. This in turn is squeezing the margins of several exporters. Exporters are also likely to diversify more into other markets in Asia, Africa and Latin America.
  • The major sectors that have shown positive growth in the last two months put together over the same period last year were iron ore (100 per cent growth), petroleum products (70 per cent), leather (33 per cent), engineering (29.6 per cent), gems and jewellery (37.8 per cent), pharmaceuticals (22 per cent), basic chemicals (38 per cent), man-made fibre (27 per cent), cotton yarn and cotton made up products (16 per cent).
  • Meanwhile, imports increased by 30.8 per cent in May to $27.4 billion (from $19.8 billion in May 2009), resulting in a trade deficit of $11.3 billion.
  • The sectors that recorded major growth in imports (cumulative growth in this fiscal over the same period in the last financial year) were electrical machinery (15 per cent), transport equipment (14.7 per cent), machine tools (15 per cent), non-ferrous metals as well as iron and steel (over 100 per cent), precious stones (over 70 per cent), chemicals (56.6 per cent) and petroleum products (over 70 per cent). The growth in capital goods imports has led to a growth in manufacturing sector.
Top 10 in Middle East:
  • Biggest Cities:
  1. Karachi, Pakistan - 11,774,000
  2. Dhaka, Bangladesh - 10,979,000
  3. Istanbul, Turkey - 9,413,000
  4. Tehrãn, Iran - 7,380,000
  5. Lahore, Pakistan - 6,030,000
  6. Baghdãd, Iraq - 4,796,000
  7. Riyadh, Saudi Arabia - 3,328,000
  8. Dusseldorf, Germany - 3,251,000
  9. Ankara, Turkey - 3,190,000
  • Business Schools:
  1. Bar-Ilan University - Israel
  2. United Arab Emirates University - United Arab Emirates
  3. Koç University Graduate School of Business - Turkey
  4. Cyprus Internation Institute of Managment - Cyprus
  5. CBL International Dubai Business School - United Arab Emirates
  6. College of Business Administration - Saudi Arabia
  7. University of Guilan - Iran
  8. King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals - Saudi Arabia
  9. Leon Recanati Graduate School of Business Administration - Israel
  10. Institute of Business Administration - Pakistan
  • Biggest Companies:
  1. Saudi Basic Inds, Saudi Arabia - chemicals
  2. Türkiye is Bankasi, Turkey - banking
  3. Akbank, Turkey - banking
  4. Saudi Telecom, Saudi Arabia - telecom services
  5. Türkiye Garanti Bankasi, Turkey - banking
  6. Teva Pharmaceutical Inds, Israel - drugs and biotechnology
  7. Al Raijhi Bank, Saudi Arabia - banking
  8. Koç Group, Turkey - conglomerate
  9. Sabanci Group, Turkey - conglomerate
  10. Bank Hapoalim, Israel - banking
Mobile Facts in Middle East:
  • MoneyGram International (NYSE:MGI), a leading global money transfer company, and National Bank of Abu Dhabi (NBAD), a leading bank in the UAE, today announced a strategic agreement that will make international money transfer services via mobile phones available for the first time to the bank's customers all over the UAE.
  • MEF opens Middle East hub
  • Qatar-based office established with lots of help from the Qtel Group
  • MEF and Qtel expect the office to play a major role in developing new mobile apps, solutions in health and education services, and will be a main driver for the emerging content ecosystem in the MENA region. It will also be responsible for liaising with regional members and localising strategic MEF initiatives.
  • Operations will be based in the Qatar Science & Technology Park (QSTP). The office opening was underpinned by an agreement between Qtel and fellow MEF member QU Wireless Innovations Centre (QUWIC) to foster mobile content innovation in the region.
  • Saudi Arabia has 21 million mobile users generating annual profits of SR13bn ($3.48bn). Out of that, Saudi Telecom Company (STC), which has long enjoyed a monopoly of the Saudi telecom market, holds a 90 per cent share of the market. The second operator, Mobily, has a 10 per cent share of the market, having grabbed a third of Saudi mobile users in its first year of operation.
  • However, it network problems are not limited to Saudi Arabia. All over the region people are still saddled with slow broadband access speeds and relatively high tariffs compared with other regions in the world.
  • The combination of a strong economy and low mobile penetration means there is still plenty of room for mobile expansion in the kingdom. The industry itself expects the Saudi market to be one of the fastest growing in the world, with penetration reaching 100 per cent by 2010.
  • The liberalisation of the Middle East market has led to a proliferation of operators in the region. Overall, there are more than 30 mobile operators in the Arab market, with many countries such as Jordan, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia having three or more operators offering mobile services, according to a recent survey by the Arab Advisors Group.
  • Middle East to hit the 200 million mobile subscribers milestone this summer
  • The Middle East region made up of 14 countries has sustained its mobile market growth in the quarter to March 2010 with a 4% sequential uptake to reach over 192 million subscribers according to recent data released by Dataxis Intelligence.
  • In fact, as features it well the figure below the number of mobile subscribers in the region grew more than a half in the last two years up from 120 million in the first quarter of 2008 which represents in absolute terms about 72 million new customers during the referred period. On average, the market grew 7.5% and saw 9 million new customers subscribing to mobile services each quarter.
  • All this dynamism has helped to propel the mobile penetration at 87% of the population up from 57% two years earlier which places the region at nearly the same level as North America.
  • ShP partners with Emax to bring mobile recycling in Middle East
  • A new mobile recycling firm, ShP will partner with Middle Eastern retailer Emax in a multi-million pound agreement that will see Emax offer mobile phone recycling for the first time in the area.
Internet Connection in Middle East:
  • UAE Internet Users Concerned About Internet Privacy
  • New research from Real Opinions shows that 60% of UAE Internet users favour behavioural targeting for customised advertising and Internet content, whilst 76% said their searches for products and visits to websites should never be monitored unless they have given express permission to do so beforehand.
  • The Here & Now survey also found that there are some Internet users that do not accept any trade off between privacy levels and behavioural targeting. When asked about the different options for websites to secure permission for monitoring, 38% of respondents believed that no tracking or monitoring of their online behaviour should be permitted under any circumstances. However, almost 6 in 10 (59% globally and also in the UAE) most preferred the method suggested of a setting in Internet browsers which allows Internet users to set global default levels of privacy rather than on a per website basis. Of note, this was most preferred option by almost 3 in 4 respondents (74%) in India and 67% in China.
  • Internet Censorship Brings Down Facebook, Twitter in Middle East
  • New rounds of censorship in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Turkey
  • The Afghan Ministry of Communications mandated last Thursday that all of Afghanistan's Internet Service Providers (ISPs) filter websites which include alcohol, social networking, gambling, and others.
  • According to the Electronic Frontier Federation (EFF), there are "countrywide blockages of Facebook, Gmail, YouTube, and Twitter." The EFF adds that questions are being referred to the Ministry of Communications by one of Afghanistan's two largest telecommunication companies, the Afghan Wireless Communication Company.
  • Pakistan announced last week that it will block links to content on Yahoo, Google, MSN, YouTube, Bing, and Amazon, with plans to completely bock 17 other sites deemed anti-Islamic, according to the EFF.
  • In Turkey, YouTube is now completely blocked.
  • "Thousands of other sites, including proxy servers that Turkish citizens were using to circumvent the bans," have been blocked, said the EFF, adding that Turkey has banned more websites than any other European country.


INTERNET MARKETING
 MOBILE MARKETING
DIRECT MARKETING

A recent study by Effective measure has revealed that 31.1 million unique browsers attributed to a 3.9% increase in users on local language news websites in the MENA region in the month of February 2012. Over 500 million web pages from websites in this category were viewed in this time, with mobile acquiring a 12.3% share.

(April 2012) 1

A recent study by Effective measure has revealed that 31.1 million unique browsers attributed to a 3.9% increase in users on local language news websites in the MENA region in the month of February 2012. Over 500 million web pages from websites in this category were viewed in this time, with mobile acquiring a 12.3% share.

(April 2012) 2

At the other end of the scale, just under a quarter of organisations (24%) say their organisation’s level of digital knowledge is poor or very poor.

(February 2012) 3

There is still a long way to go, however, as the research shows that over a third of companies (36%) are at the experimental stages of interacting with social media.

(February 2012) 4
SMS is the most frequently used mobile marketing channel or technology, with 52% of companies reporting that they are using text messaging for marketing.
(February 2012) 1
Few companies are focusing on the basics of mobile optimization, with only 6% using mobile-optimized emails or mobile commerce.
(February 2012) 2

SMS is the mostly frequently used mobile marketing channel or technology, with 52% of companies reporting that they are using text messaging for marketing.

(February 2012) 3

Few companies are focusing on the basics of mobile optimisation, with only 6% using mobileoptimised emails or mobile commerce.

(February 2012) 4
In terms of offline channels, print media is still the most commonly used offline marketing method, with 70% of company respondancts reporting they use newspapers and magazines for marketing.
(February 2012) 1
The second most frequently used marketing method is direct mail, which is used by just half of marketers (48%).
(February 2012) 2

Among 355 people surveyed in Saudi Arabia, offline newspaper readership still surpassed online sources, 48 percent to 44 percent.

(February 2011) 3

Newspapers and magazines have been declining since 2007, with a brief pause for magazines in 2010. We expect this decline to continue throughout our forecast period. Magazines are suffering less than newspapers, because the experience of reading a magazine is less easy to replicate online, and because they do not rely so much on the timely delivery of information, where the internet has a big advantage over newspapers. We predict magazine ad expenditure will shrink by 0.7% a year over our forecast period, while newspaper ad expenditure shrinks by 1.1%.

(December 2011) 4

MARKETING OPERATIONS
 MARKETING SPEND
GLOBAL MARKET RESOURCES

The number of European consumers who indicated a lack of extra money was up in each of the top five countries, with the number of Italians up from 8% in 2009 to 21% this year and almost 28% of French (up from 17% last year).

(December 2010) 1
More than 75% of companies surveyed by Gartner said they would cut 20% or more of their marketing budget. (September 2009) 2
The solution, spend more on marketing resource management (MRM). (September 2009) 3
MRM is a set of processes that tries to enhance and optimize marketing processes, both internal and external. (September 2009) 4
The vast majority of companies are planning to ramp up social media activity 2012, with 81% expecting to increase investment this year.
(February 2012) 1
Digital marketing in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) is experiencing tremendous growth, according to an Econsultancy report, which has found that 58% of marketers are increasing their digital marketing budgets in 2012.
(February 2012) 2

According to the report by Econsultancy, over half of companies (52%) are increasing their digital marketing budgets by at least 20%.

(February 2012) 3

The most widely cited barrier to digital marketing is thought to be restricted budgets for all types of marketing, which is cited by some 31% of responding companies. However beyond budgets, other factors preventing organisations from investing more money in digital include company culture and reliance on traditional marketing.

(February 2012) 4
BBC Country Profiles
Economist Country Briefings
Euromonitor World and Country Factfiles
Country Profiles from World Trade Press
Stratfor Geopolitical Intelligence
CIA World Factbook
Voyage Country profiles
Library of Congress Country Profiles
CountryReports.org
Kwintessential Country Profiles
Infoplease Country Profiles
Geohive Global Statistics
NationMaster.com

CMO Council Contact
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donovan@cmocouncil.org

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