Land Electric Mobility in the Arab Region: Options and Opportunities
Steven Kenney, founder and principal of Foresight Vector, served from 2020 to early 2025 as the founding Director of the Strategic Foresight Initiative program at The Middle East Institute, a leading Washington DC research institution. While in this role, he was the study director and lead author of a series of reports for the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (UN ESCWA) under its “Megatrends” series of studies.
As ESCWA described it on their website, this report explores electric mobility (e-mobility), a megatrend that will have profound global economic, financial, social-cultural, environmental and other ramifications. The increasing number of vehicles, fleets and transportation systems propelled by electric powertrain technologies are already having immense impacts around the world, and these impacts will increase and scale over the next two decades and beyond. The time for Arab decision makers to address the e-mobility megatrend is now, through policy, investment and other actions. The present study on the future of e-mobility is the first analysis of such megatrends by the United Nations Economic Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA). The report focuses predominantly on e-mobility on land, discussing the accelerating increase of electric automobiles, trucks and other road vehicles including micro-mobility, electric buses and public transportation systems. The focus on land e-mobility was chosen because this domain offers the greatest impact soonest for the Arab region. By researching and employing strategic foresight on the various transformative development paths land e-mobility could bring to the development of Arab countries and the Arab region, the report raises key findings, messages and recommendations so Arab decision makers, policymakers and other stakeholders can make the changes that will be necessary if they are to successfully make e-mobility part of their future at scale and reap the potential benefits of this megatrend.