Jeddah – Saudi Minister of Communications and Information Technology Mohammed al-Suwaiyil said that privatizing Saudi Postal will start at the beginning of 2017.

Suwaiyil was speaking at a joint press conference held by three ministers to talk about the National Transformation Plan (NTP) which includes a series of reforms aiming to increase the governmental non-oil revenues to 141 billion dollars by 2020.

NTP aims to privatize a number of companies and services in several sectors from health care to municipal and communication, to boost efficiency and ease pressure on state finances.

During the press conference, Suwaiyil said that Saudi Postal Corp, with over ten thousand employee, will be one of the first to be privatized. He added that the plan is to create a holding company which would own subsidiaries operating services such as mail, courier delivery, and e-commerce.

When asked about the expected time-frame of the privatization, Suwaiyil said that the committee is the one to determine that but he expected execution to begin by early 2017.

Suwaiyil also said that authorities are studying whether the Saudi Postal would be offered to public offer of shares or foreign strategic investors.

By privatizing Saudi Postal, the government hopes it will increase its revenues to reach SR2.75 billion in 2020, and thus annual government subsidies will fall to zero.

“Saudi Postal depends on subsidies from the government. Privatization will empower it,” said Suwaiyil.