The Reuters reports that Saudi Arabian construction company Saudi Binladin Group has laid off about 77,000 foreign workers and plans to cut thousands of jobs held by Saudi nationals.
Binladin has issued 77,000 final exit visas to foreign workers so that they can leave Saudi Arabia, and is expected to lay off 12,000 of 17,000 Saudis in supervisory, administrative, engineering and management jobs, Reuters quoted al-Watan newspaper.
While Saudi construction companies regularly cut or expand their foreign staff in response to changing demand in the industry, they rarely lay off large numbers of Saudis, partly because it is legally difficult and expensive.
The total workforce at Binladin, one of Saudi Arabia’s biggest firms and among the Middle East’s largest builders, is around 200,000, according to its LinkedIn page.
Asked to comment, Binladin did not give a figure for job cuts but said: “Our manpower size is always proportional to the nature and scale of the undertaken projects, along with the time spans required to complete them.