For the past few years, much of the talk coming out of Saudi Arabia has been about opportunity – a chance to use the oil boom to develop the economy and go some way to heading off pressing social and economic pressures that have been building up in the kingdom.

During the late 1980s and 1990s, the economy stagnated while the population ballooned. By the turn of the century, unemployment had reached double digits and, with some 60 per cent of the 17m national population estimated to be under 25, the need to expand the private sector and create jobs was deemed vital to the nation’s stability and its future prosperity.