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4.9. Agricultural policy priorities are linked to Vision 2030 (...).In this framework, making the use of natural resources (i.e. water) more sustainable remains a key objective of agricultural policy (...) These objectives are complemented by the objective to strengthen sustainable rural development, in particular building capacity of small farmers, assisting with the selection of crops (and through AFD loans), and protecting plant and animal health. Thirteen Vision Realization Programs support Vision 2030 and set out key performance indicators. Among the Programs are the National Transformation Program (NTP) [6] and the Sustainable Agricultural Rural Development Program under the NTP.

[6]Under the NTP, for example, more than 1600 hectares of terraces have been rehabilitated since 2018 and contribute to rationalized and more efficient water use in crops that are profitable for farmers.

4.11. The overall 2020 budget allocated to the economic resources sector, which includes funding for the environmental, water, and agriculture sector, is SAR 98 billion. Of this amount, SAR 11.5 billion is allocated to the Ministry of Environment, Water and Agriculture (...) Over its 2018-25 horizon, the Sustainable Agricultural Rural Development Program has been approved with SAR 8.75 billion.

4.14. Access to renewable water remains the biggest constraint to agricultural production. Agriculture accounted for 82% of the nearly 26 billion m3 of water consumption in 2018. Of the water consumed by agriculture, most (also 82%) comes from non-renewable groundwater. While no disaggregated data for the sector are available, agriculture is primarily under irrigation with water from deep wells tapping non-renewable aquifers, as surface and renewable groundwater is limited. Vision 2030 aims to prioritize the use of water in agriculture to those areas with natural and renewable water sources, adjust the crop mix towards crops with lower water use, and rebalance the mix of imports and domestic production for food security. With these policies, the Government aims to reduce agriculture's consumption of non-renewable groundwater from 19 billion m3/year in 2016 to 6.5 billion m3/year in 2030. According to the authorities, demand for non-renewable groundwater in agriculture declined to 10.5 billion m3 in 2019.

4.15. In November 2018, in an effort to reduce water consumption, the Government started to implement a Green Fodder Ban policy that had been under development since 2015. The policy aims to reduce production of green fodder significantly and help reduce water consumption by 9 billion m3 as part of the Vision 2030 objectives. As a result, the production of green fodder started to decline from 2018 (...).

4.17. Support for the production of domestic wheat ended in 2016, but to mitigate the impact of the green fodder ban on small farmers, Saudi Arabia reintroduced purchases of domestic wheat production in 2018, offering farmers an alternative to green fodder production. Small farmers (holding less than 100 hectares) who want to grow wheat on not more than 50 hectares of their land need to obtain a licence from the Ministry of Environment, Water, and Agriculture.

4.29. In 2017, the Council of Ministers approved the Comprehensive Mining and Mining Industries Strategy, which aims to address several challenges confronting the sector. These include: (...) (iv) inadequate compliance with environmental protection standards; (...).

4.37. In order to grow and diversify the economy, which is one of the strategic objectives of Vision 2030 (Section 2), Saudi Arabia aims to maximize the value captured from the energy sector through: (...) (iv) increased contribution of renewables to the national energy mix (...). Energy is one of four key sectors addressed by the NIDLP. [40]
[40] The NIDLP (...) aims to: (i) increase the contribution of renewable energy to the energy mix; (...) (iii) create jobs and work opportunities in renewable energy by increasing local content and training and qualifying the workforce (...) and (v) reduce emissions from burning fuel.

4.64. (...) increasing gas production and distribution capacity is one of the objectives of Vison 2030. The Government set the target of increasing the share of natural gas in the domestic energy mix to 70%. (...) The expansion of gas production is expected to be achieved both through the incremental expansion of current projects and the exploitation of untapped gas reserves not associated with oil production. Increased production of natural gas is seen as critically important to the country's Kingdom's diversification and energy transition strategy in that it provides low-cost and clean feedstock to the petrochemical and power-generation sectors.

4.68. (...) Electricity consumption increased slightly between 2015 and 2018 and declined in 2019 (Table 4.15) Among the factors explaining the slower growth, and decline, in consumption are more stringent energy efficiency and energy intensity standards under the Saudi Energy Efficiency Programme and increases in electricity prices that occurred in 2016 and 2018. (...)

4.71. Reform of the electricity sector was a priority in the economic transformation envisaged by Vision 2030. The NIDLP points to the following key problems in this sector: (...) (v) limited reliance on renewable energy.