Gulf oil producers are finding it difficult to diversify their economies away from their biggest export revenue contributor, and it may take them at least a decade to make any progress on this. This is what Moody’s forecast in a recent report , as quoted by Reuters, noting that this reliance on oil revenues would be the “key credit constraint” for the six members of the Gulf Cooperation Council: Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. The forecast hardly comes as a surprise for anyone watching the region. The Gulf oil economies tried to diversify their economies amid the 2014 oil price crash, but they lacked the resources to do much precisely because of the oil price crash. To tackle the crisis, the governments of these countries had to introduce austerity measures and attempted some reforms, which were met by strong public opposition, hinting of […]