Small business will be the engine of the Gulf’s post-lockdown recovery

Small business will be the engine of the Gulf’s post-lockdown recovery

Pakiza Abdulrahman is the manager of Startup Business Development, Bahrain Economic Development Board

Across the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), governments are tentatively beginning to reopen their economies. Restaurants are once again accepting bookings for socially-distanced, outdoor dining; offices are getting busier and even border restrictions are gradually loosening. The King Fahad causeway - one of the busiest crossings in the Middle East, which connects Saudi Arabia to Bahrain - is now allowing the passage of passengers with precautionary measures. Throughout the GCC, governments are surveying the economic impact of robust, regionwide lockdown and quarantine measures. Now they are turning their attention to the future, to the question of recovery and driving sustainable economic growth.

Even before the paradigm shifting effects of the Covid-19 pandemic were felt, the GCC was undergoing a major