DUBAI: Saudi Arabia has moved another step closer to seeing cinemas returning to the Kingdom, after the regulations on the appropriate licensing received official approval on Thursday, state news agency SPA reported.
The process of drawing up the regulations has undergone close scrutiny by various Saudi government departments including the Ministry of Interior, Ministry of Finance, and the Department of Civil Defense.
On Thursday the directors of the General Commission for Audiovisual Media gave its approval for the regulations regarding licensing, under the chairmanship of Minister of Culture Awwad bin Saleh Al-Awwad
Officials in the Kingdom had studied best practices for regulations in the governing of cinemas in a number of countries.
Included in the regulations are three types of license allowing the establishing cinemas, operation of the facility, and a license permitting both fixed and temporary cinemas.
Al-Awwad said the cinema sector was “important for cultural and creative richness.”
He added that cinemas were “an incentive for the services and entertainment sector,” which he said contributed to “achieving the objectives of economic diversification, opening the door to a giant local market comprising 30 million people, and providing new job opportunities for citizens.”
The minister said the aim of the return of cinemas in the Kingdom was to create a competitive media industry, something he said would be achieved by providing and supporting the production of appropriate and positive content.
The introduction of cinemas in the Kingdom, Al-Awwad said, represented a “pivotal turning point toward building a cultural economy, reviving the cultural scene in the Kingdom.”
Cinema goers got a taste of things to come in January when they attended a screening of a children’s film “The Emoji Movie” in a temporary movie theater set up in a cultural center in Jeddah.
Saudi authorities expect to open 300 cinemas with 2,000 screens by 2030, building an industry it hopes will contribute more than $24 billion to the economy and create 30,000 permanent jobs.
Regional and international cinema chains are also eyeing the Saudi market, keen to tap the spending power of the young people who make up roughly 70 percent of the population.
