For the past ten days, the Parisian business world has been living on Saudi time. An imposing delegation of ministers, entrepreneurs, and senior officials of the kingdom, criss-crosses the banks of the Seine, on the lookout for investment opportunities and to praise the merits of Vision 2030, the modernization plan of Arabia . The main palaces of the capital, such as the George-V and the Plaza Athénée, are filled with Saudi VIPs, foot soldiers of a real charm offensive.
The arrival of this delegation was coordinated with the arrival in Paris of the heir to the throne of Riyadh, Prince Mohammed Ben Salman. The strongman of the Saudi crown, nicknamed “MBS”, met Emmanuel Macron twice: Friday, June 16, one-on-one, as part of a working lunch at the Elysée; and Thursday, June 22, on the occasion of the summit for a new financial pact, North-South high mass, organized at the Palais Brongniart, in the center of Paris, in the presence of around fifty heads of state and government.
Around these two politico-diplomatic meetings, Saudi businessmen and government officials deployed in half a dozen events of an economic and promotional nature. The high point of this seduction operation took place on Monday, June 19, in two stages: in the morning with the Franco-Saudi Investment Forum, and in the evening during a gala reception on the Champ-de- March, intended to promote Riyadh’s bid to host the 2030 World Expo.
Context of the development of Franco-Saudi economic relations
This Saudi week ended with the signing of a series of agreements, mixing firm contracts and simple memoranda of understanding (“memorandum of understanding”: “MoU”, in business jargon), subject to possible revision, and by the announcement of the opening in Paris of an office of the Public investment fund (PIF), the sovereign wealth fund of the monarchy. The two main breakthroughs in the tricolor industry are the sale of 30 Airbus A320s to the Saudi low-cost airline Fly Nas, for an amount of 3 billion euros, and the sale of around a hundred helicopters, still by Airbus. , to the Saudi group Ajlan. Two contracts concluded at the Paris Air Show.
These announcements come in a context of booming Franco-Saudi economic relations. According to Khaled Al-Faleh, the Saudi investment minister, trade between the two countries, valued at 11 billion euros in 2022, is up 47% compared to the previous year. A result partly due to the increase in the cost of French imports of petroleum products, the price of which rose sharply with the war in Ukraine.
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