Saudi Arabia’s tourism sector is undergoing a profound economic transformation, moving beyond its traditional role as a service industry to become a pillar of national transformation and one of the most value-generating activities in the medium and long term.
This shift results from dismantling old policy frameworks and redesigning a regulatory structure that enables unprecedented local and international investment flows, establishing a new tourism model based on the knowledge economy, modern technologies, and sustainable governance.
The sector now holds a central position within Vision 2030 as a diversification pathway inseparable from efforts to develop infrastructure, reshape the urban landscape, and advance creative and cultural industries. Tourism has also become an integrative platform connecting sectors such as air transport, logistics, hospitality, and natural and cultural heritage, giving it an economic dimension that transcends the tourist as an individual experience to a vast production system capable of creating new markets and activating previously untapped value chains.
Re-engineering the Global Tourism Economy
The “Beyond Tourism” initiative, launched by Saudi Arabia in partnership with the World Economic Forum (WEF), represents an intellectual shift in how the sector is planned and directed. Instead of merely increasing visitor numbers or developing new sites, the initiative aims to rebuild the tourism value chain by linking the sector to infrastructure, the cultural economy, advanced technologies, and local communities.
The initiative is based on 10 principles that form a developmental framework giving the tourism industry the ability to balance economic returns with the preservation of natural and cultural resources. This includes empowering small and medium enterprises, transforming cultural institutions into scalable economic assets, and redesigning the visitor experience to enhance integration between the public and private sectors.
In addition to the local dimension, the initiative offers a globally applicable model by setting measurable standards for destination management and defining financial and economic tools that allow countries to exploit their tourism resources without harming their environments or cultural identities. Thus, Saudi Arabia is becoming a key contributor to shaping the future of tourism policies, not just a beneficiary.
Producing Sustainable Tourism Policies
Saudi Arabia and the World Economic Forum are building a broad international alliance comprising governments, financial institutions, and global companies; aiming to develop new operational tools for the sector, including tourism demand management systems, congestion prediction models, and environmental and economic impact assessment frameworks.
This alliance responds to a growing recognition that global tourism faces challenges related to overcrowding, infrastructure pressures, and the declining capacity of traditional destinations to absorb rapid growth.
This cooperation enables the Kingdom to lead a global discussion that goes beyond destination development to the reformulation of tourism governance; the increasing focus on sustainability, carrying capacity, and experience quality places Saudi Arabia in an advanced position as a country with vast spaces, untapped natural resources, and infrastructure under development that can be designed from the outset according to the highest global standards.
Redrawing the Global Tourism Map
International indicators confirm that the Kingdom has, in a short period, surpassed many established tourism economies. Saudi Arabia led the growth in international tourism revenues in the first quarter of 2025, ranking third globally in the number of inbound tourists, with a growth rate of 102% compared to pre-pandemic levels.
This dynamic is reflected in domestic revenues, which reached 49.4 billion riyals, driven by improved experience quality, higher average spending per person, and diversified tourism products. Data also indicates improved sector resilience and its ability to create direct and indirect jobs, making it one of the most impactful sectors in the non-oil GDP.
These indicators support estimates by Goldman Sachs, which places Saudi Arabia among the world’s three fastest-growing tourism markets. In the same context, a report by the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) indicates that the sector’s contribution will exceed $100 billion before 2030, reshaping the relative weight of tourism in the structure of the Saudi economy as a sector capable of competing with heavy industries and financial services in growth and return rates.
