“We are changing the way we provide assistance and development assistance,” Saudi Finance Minister Mohammed Al-Jadaan said Wednesday at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
“We used to give direct grants and deposits without strings attached and we are changing that,” Al-Jadaan said during a panel discussion that included IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva. “We are working with multilateral institutions to actually say we need to see reforms.”
The Gulf’s leading Sunni power and the biggest oil exporter in the world has long provided a financial backstop for troubled economies in the region with billions of dollars worth of grants and deposits. It’s now flush with a massive windfall from energy revenue last year.
