A stubbornly high youth unemployment rate is one of Oman's most pressing internal issues. Roughly half of Oman's youths are unemployed, the World Bank estimates.

In 2011, late Sultan Qaboos announced the creation of 50,000 jobs for Omanis in an attempt to defuse unprecedented nationwide protests. Similar promises were made in 2017, 2018 and 2019, yet many Omanis await structural economic reforms, as the hydrocarbon industry accounts for 74% of government revenues but employs only 16,000 citizens of the Gulf state.

“I am pretty sure the economy will dictate certain unavoidable reforms in the next few years,” John Sfakianakis, the chief economist of the Saudi Arabia-based Gulf Research Center, told Al-Monitor.

In an attempt to energize the domestic economy, the country’s road map for social and economic reform identifies five high-priority sectors, including the employment-intensive tourism industry. Ranked as one of the fastest growing industries in the world, the tourism sector could employ a total of 535,000 people, directly and indirectly, in Oman by 2040 to cater to 11 million visitors.