The Omani government is planning to appoint a consultant before the end of November to help set up a public-private partnership (PPP) unit to oversee its future programme of infrastructure projects.

According to a source close to the programme, Muscat is planning to appoint a consultant “in the next few weeks; before the end of the month.”

At MEED’s recent Oman Projects Forum in the sultanate, Oman’s Minister of Commerce and Industry Ali Massoud al-Sunaidy revealed that the Supreme Council was preparing regulations to enable the use of PPPs to develop major housing and infrastructure schemes.

While Oman is the Middle East’s pioneer in the PPP model for the power sector, launching the region’s first independent power project (IPP) in 1994 at Manah, it does not have a track record in delivering PPP projects in other sectors.  

Speaking at the Oman Projects Forum, Al-Sunaidy revealed that Oman’s 2016-20 five-year plan will continue social spending and investment, which will be enabled by a new PPP framework to ease budgetary constraints caused by lower oil prices.  

In May, the Supreme Council began preparing frameworks for private sector investment in affordable housing.

It is planning to allow investment funds, private developers or the government to undertake residential developments in the sultanate using PPP models. The council has said the properties must be affordable developments for Omani citizens.

The long-term contracts will allow private firms to develop integrated residential complexes. They would include infrastructure and services, as well as recreational and commercial facilities.