Foreign engineers with less than five years of work experience will no longer be recruited for employment in Saudi Arabia, the Saudi Council of Engineers said.
In a report by Saudi Gazette, engineering companies involved in urgent projects have been given a three-month deadline to terminate the contracts of inexperienced engineers who applied for recruitment before the decision.
Expat engineers in the country will also have to undergo professional test and personal interview to ensure their familiarity with the profession and their specialization.
The new rule will override a previous mandate by the Saudi Council of Engineers which required a three-year experience, a personal interview and a professional test as minimum conditions for the recruitment of expatriate engineers.
Engineers will bear the consequences if their submitted documents will fail to prove the required experience and competency. The aim of this decision is to provide the opportunity for Saudi engineers, to create jobs for them in the engineering sector, and to empower them so that they can gain experience in engineering fields.
The Ministry of Labor and Social Development has expressed its support for the decision of the Saudi Council of Engineers to stop recruiting expatriate engineers with less than five years of professional experience.
In August, the Ministry of Labor and Social Development and Saudi Council of Engineers reached an agreement to stop recruitment of expatriate engineers with limited experience.
Dr. Jameel Al-Baq’awi, chairman of the SCE, and Dr. Ahmed Al-Qattan, undersecretary for labor policies in the ministry, said the agreement would provide more jobs to Saudi engineers in the government and private sectors.
