The Impact of COVID-19 on the Economies of Petroleum-Exporting Middle Eastern Countries

The paper investigates the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the petroleum-exporting countries in the Middle East region. This region mainly includes Saudi Arabia (KSA), Unites Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain, Qatar, Yemen, Oman, Jordan, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Turkey, and Egypt. This research quantifies the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on each country in the Middle East separately. The research divides the countries of the Middle East into four main groups: countries with strong financial reserves, countries with medium financial reserves, countries with weak financial reserves, and countries with weak financial reserves and unstable situations. The research found that the economies of the Middle East countries differ in terms of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on each country, mainly due to the variation in the preventive measures taken in each country to reduce the impact of the pandemic. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023.