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The Economic Impact of SAHER Cameras in SaudiArabia

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Introduction

SAHER is the new traffic control system which the Saudi government introduced in 2009.

SAHER is an Arabic term and the meaning of this term is “watchful”. The basic objectives

to be achieved through installing this system in Saudi Arabia is to improve the efficiency

of traffic flow and minimize the number of accidents. This technology is based on

intelligent transportation system applications traffic management subsystem, traffic

enforcement, and to increase the level of safety on roadway networks. SAHER project will

help the government in achieving these objectives by improving the road congestion,

contributing by keeping the fatality rate low, and enhancing the outcome from the

transportation infrastructure. The government has developed the National Information

Center of the Ministry of Interior which will monitor the traffic through a network of

digital camera (Ministry of Interior, 2017). The key functions of this intelligent

transportation system include:

Monitoring the closed-circuit cameras

License Plat Recognition (LPR)

Auto Vehicle Location (AVL)

Traffic Management System (TMS)

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Law Enforcement System (LES)

The roads in Saudi Arabia are considered to be one of the most dangerous roads of the

world. According to the General Directorate of Traffic in Saudi Arabia, approximately 17

people die in road accidents. The number of road accidents per capita in Saudi Arabia is

highest as compared to any other country of the world. According to the World Health

Organization (WHO), road accident is the major cause of death in young adults between

the age 16 and 36. More than 485,000 accidents were reported in Saudi Arabia in 2008.

Approximately 6.485 people died in these accidents and about 36,000 people got

seriously injured. The seriousness of the issue highlighted the need of a technology-based

solution of this manmade epidemic (Al-Sughair, 2014).

SAHER was introduced as the technology-based solution of this problem. The

government in Saudi Arabia did not release any official report or statistics regarding this

project it is very difficult to study the antecedents and influence of this project. A very

limited source of data for this project include the regional websites, for example, the

Ministry of Interior of Saudi Arabia. The SAHER project was launched by Dalla Albaraka

which is Saudi national company. This company was founded in Riyadh by Sheikh Saleh

Kamel in 1969. This company has significant economic influence in almost all public

sector departments in Saudi Arabia including operations, maintenance, transportation,

finance, healthcare, real-estate, and trading. It is a very large business group which

operates almost in entire Middle East and it is the fifth largest company in the Middle

East. Dalla Albaraka Company provided the government with idea about this

transportation system in 2008 and the executed it as a project which completed in 2009

(The Arab News, 2017).

SAHER is an integrated transportation control system which utilizes radar and laser

system to catch the violators of the traffic laws. The laser system is installed in all of the

cities but radar is used only in Jeddah. The basic infrastructure of this system was

developed by the Multanova Company. It is Swiss Company and it was established in

1952. This company developed an application to monitor and control the transportation

system using the radar technology. The radar technology is very effective in monitoring

the traffic and indicate the speed violations. The SAHER technology is based on similar

technology. The cameras are installed on the highways as well as the traffic lights (Wald,

2017).

The project was proposed by Dalla Albaraka Company in 2008. The purpose of proposing

this project was to improve the efficiency of the traffic system and minimize the number

of accidents on the road. This project has certain economic implications as well. It was

proposed as “Build, Operate, and Transfer” (BOT) project. The government in Saudi

Arabia asked the investors to work on this project using their own capital and operate this

project for five years. The investors were offered with good share of profit on their

investment. The entire country was divided into three distinct regions to install and

operate this project (Ministry of Interior, 2017). These regions include:

Middle: Project carried out by Omar Qassim Aleesaay Company

West: Project carried out by Dalla Albaraka Group

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East: Project carried out by Etehad Alafandy Group

The key economic impact of this project is collection of revenues and fines. The phase one

of this project was enforcing the traffic laws through automated traffic violation

application. The drivers who violated the speed limits or traffic lights are fined. The

violators are fined through SAHER tickets. The second phase of this project consisted of

installing the cameras which could regulate the traffic smartly using the business

intelligence technology (Ministry of Interior, 2017).

Another important economic impact of this system was through avoiding the accidents.

The government can save millions of Riyals every year through avoiding accidental

insurance and damage to the public property due to the accidents. Finally, this project has

positively influenced the economy by creating more jobs (Ministry of Interior, 2017).

Research Question

Question: How SAHER project impact the economy by creating more jobs?

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