RIYADH — The Council of Ministers on Monday adopted a series of procedures aimed at regulating and developing the small and medium enterprises (SMEs) on the pattern of the best practices prevailing in the world so as to raise their productivity and make them a major agent of national growth and development. The weekly session of the Cabinet, chaired by Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman at Al-Yamama palace here, approved the creation of the Higher Authority for SMEs in this regard. In a statement to the Saudi Press Agency following the session, Minister of Culture and Information Adel Al-Turaifi said the authority will have a board of directors headed by the minister of commerce and industry. It will enjoy independent administrative and financial powers. "The authority aims at regulating SMEs in the Kingdom as well as in supporting, developing and taking care of them in line with the best international practices," Turaifi said. "This will be done to achieve the objective of raising their productivity, increasing their contribution to gross domestic product (GDP), raising their capacity to play a role in the national economy in order to generate more jobs for Saudis and nationalization of technology," he added. According to the Cabinet directives, the mission to take care of SMEs will be transferred from the Saudi Credit and Savings Bank (SCSB) to the new authority. Similarly, the secretariat for the Coordination Council of SMEs sector at SCSB and the National Center for SMEs at the ministry of commerce and industry will also be handed to the authority. The task of funding SMEs will be transferred from SCSB to the Saudi Industrial Development Fund. According to the new regulations, SCSB and other government agencies will continue to carry out their activities related to SMEs until the completion of the procedures for the creation of the authority. Al-Turaifi said the Cabinet also reviewed the recommendations of the committee formed to study the best alternatives to supply gas to consumers in a highly efficient manner. Accordingly, it endorsed a number of procedures, including instructing the National Gas and Industrialization Company (GASCO) to implement earlier Cabinet proposals to establish a pipeline from Saudi Aramco's gas plant to Riyadh, and building new gas stations in regions that are far away from the current stations, and storage of a stock of gas in all its stations equivalent to a minimum of 20 days of consumption. The Cabinet instructed that a sufficient number of trucks be provided to transport gas in accordance with the technical regulations issued by the Saudi Standards, Metrology and Quality Organization as well as the instructions issued by Supreme Commission for Industrial Security. In another decision, the Cabinet endorsed uniform administrative regulation for all governorates and directed the Ministry of Interior to create offices for women as part of the organizational structure of the governorates. The Cabinet approved converting the Central Department of Statistics and Information into an authority called General Authority for Statistics with independent powers. It also approved a regulation for the National Committee to follow up initiatives of King Abdullah for dialogue among followers of various religions and cultures. Al-Turaifi said the Cabinet endorsed appointing 27 persons as members of circuits under the Supreme Commission for the Settlement of the Labor Disputes. On the occasion of the celebration of the United Nations' 70th anniversary, Al-Turaifi said, the Cabinet expressed the Kingdom's readiness to cooperate with other member states to achieve the noble objective of the world body's reforms.
