The protein system
The Gulf feeds 61 million people with very little farmland or water.[3] Protein supply ranges from 92.8 grams per person a day in Oman to 110.6 in Qatar, above what people need in every member. Animal foods provide from 44 per cent of protein in Saudi Arabia to 57 per cent in Bahrain.[2]
Most of the protein produced at home is dairy, poultry and eggs, from farms that rely on feed bought abroad. Saudi Arabia alone is forecast to import about 4.7 million tonnes of maize and 4.2 million tonnes of barley in 2025/26, and nearly all the barley goes to animals.[6]
Where the Gulf does produce protein, it does so on a commercial scale. In 2024 Saudi dairy farms produced 131 per cent of the country's needs and poultry farms 72 per cent, against 52 per cent for fish. Saudi boats landed 74,700 tonnes of sea fish in 2023, on ministry figures, and Oman produced 146 per cent of its own fish needs in 2025.[4, 5, 33, 34] These are useful amounts, but too small to form a broad farm base for countries this rich. They depend on desalinated water or ancient groundwater, air-conditioned barns, and imported feed and breeding stock.
Durable domestic capacity:
Self-sufficiency figures make the Gulf look stronger than it is, because they are counted one product at a time. Behind self-sufficiency in dairy, eggs, dates and much poultry, the Gulf imports about 85 per cent of its food overall and 93 per cent of its cereals.[1] Saudi dairy at 131 per cent and poultry at 72 per cent are produced at scale from imported maize, barley and breeding stock, and from water that is either desalinated or pumped from ancient aquifers.[4, 5, 6] Saudi Arabia began phasing out its own wheat in 2008 and ended the programme in 2016 because the groundwater was running out. Hydrologists cited by the US Geological Survey think that groundwater is worth pumping for only about another 50 years.[7] The region's best-funded attempt to grow its own staples ended because the water ran out, not the money.
Commercial dairy, poultry and fish farms work at scale, but they are small next to what the Gulf eats, and they depend on imported feed, desalinated water and energy.
Resource headroom:
The Gulf has little room to grow more food. Renewable water ranges from 4 cubic metres per person a year in Kuwait to 75 in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. Water stress begins at 1,700.[8] Less than 5 per cent of the land is arable, and farming uses 70 to 80 per cent of the scarce water.[9] So more poultry and dairy means more imported feed.[6]
There is plenty of irrigation for the small area farmed. In 2024, 73 per cent of cropland could be irrigated, up from 46 per cent in 2000.[82] But Saudi Arabia actually irrigated only 757,500 of its 3.28 million irrigable hectares in 2024. Much of the unused capacity dates from the wheat programme that ended in 2016.[82] Cropland grew 17 per cent between 2000 and 2024, but the population grew 142 per cent, so cropland per person fell 52 per cent.[82, 84]
Several members lend little to farming. In Bahrain, the UAE and Oman, farms get less bank lending than their share of the economy, and the gap has widened since 2000.[83]
Energy and money partly make up for the lack of land and water. The six states run about 3,401 desalination plants, about a third of the world's daily capacity. They supply commercial dairy, poultry, greenhouses and fish farms.[8] But these systems cannot grow staple crops at scale. They need constant energy and water, and they can themselves be attacked.[8, 16]
Import exposure:
This is the Gulf's defining weakness, and the 2026 closure of Hormuz tested it. The Gulf imports about 85 to 90 per cent of its food, and more than 70 per cent of those imports normally pass through Hormuz.[12] The Middle East Institute puts 81 per cent of rice through the strait. Grain is split across two exposed routes: about 39 per cent of wheat and other grains from western suppliers comes through Bab el-Mandeb, and 35 per cent through Hormuz.[10] The suppliers are few as well. Across the five members that report rice imports, India supplied 76.1 per cent in 2024 and Pakistan 13.7 per cent by weight.[11]
Tanker traffic through Hormuz was down by more than 90 per cent when FAO's chief economist assessed the crisis on 26 March 2026, and the closure was still disrupting Gulf shipping in July.[14, 17] Grain shipments were disrupted at once, and Saudi Arabia moved its purchases to King Abdullah Port and Jeddah on the Red Sea.[13]
The Gulf has found partial ways round the strait. Saudi Arabia's Red Sea ports, Oman's Salalah and Duqm and the UAE's east coast have all worked in a real crisis. Weekly container traffic at Khor Fakkan rose from about 8,000 to 65,000 TEUs after ships were diverted. Gulftainer is spending US$2 billion to raise yearly capacity from 3.5 to 10 million TEUs, and Fujairah has silos for 300,000 tonnes of grain.[17, 35] None of this helps Qatar, Kuwait or Bahrain, which have no coast outside the Gulf.
Upstream dependence:
Feed matters most for a protein system built on poultry, dairy and fish farms, and the Gulf imports nearly all of it.[6] Breeding stock is imported too. Baladna's dairy herd in Qatar began with about 4,000 Holstein cows flown in from the United States and Europe after the June 2017 blockade. Another 3,200 arrived by sea in May 2018, with 3,000 more planned for that November. The same model runs across the Gulf.[24]
For other inputs, the Gulf sells to the world rather than buying. Qatar's QAFCO can make 5.6 million tonnes of urea and 3.8 million tonnes of ammonia a year, and calls itself the world's largest single-site urea exporter, with 14 per cent of world supply.[31] The Gulf petrochemicals association gives a more cautious figure: about 7 per cent of world nitrogen and phosphate output, with Saudi Arabia fifth in nitrogen and sixth in phosphate.[29] Ma'aden's Phosphate 3 complex will add 3 million tonnes, taking phosphate fertiliser capacity to about 9 million tonnes a year, with the second phase due in 2027.[30] The energy for fertiliser, desalination and cold stores is produced at home.
Gulf-owned trading companies add a further buffer. Saudi Arabia's SALIC owns 81.81 per cent of Olam Agri, up from just over 80 per cent, after folding in Continental Farmers Group in July 2026. That gives the Gulf its own global business for buying, processing and trading grain. Al Dahra does the same for animal fodder. Abu Dhabi's ADQ has held a large stake since 2021.[25, 28] These companies give Gulf buyers more control over where food comes from and how it travels than buying on the open market.
Access and affordability:
Foreign workers make up about 55 per cent of the Gulf's people.[49] Saudi Arabia's 2023 household survey found typical monthly income after tax of SAR 2,896 for citizens and SAR 1,372 for non-citizens. A healthy diet costs about 6 and 12.5 per cent of those amounts.[48, 51] About 87 per cent of people in the UAE are not citizens.[49, 54]
is 2.5 per cent or less in Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Kuwait, and 5.9 per cent in Oman.[36] is 10.8 per cent in Saudi Arabia and 11.4 per cent in Oman.[37]
Protection for migrant workers is uneven. Saudi Arabia and the UAE set no minimum wage for migrant workers. Bahrain's minimum wage covers only nationals in the public sector, and Oman's leaves out migrant workers.[61, 62, 63, 64] Qatar and Kuwait set minimum wages, but Qatar does not require employers to report food or housing allowances.[59, 60, 65] Qatar's QAR 300 food allowance is more than the estimated cost of a healthy diet.[48, 59, 66] A 2021 survey found 68 per cent of workers in Qatar had paid recruitment fees, averaging US$1,333.[68]
Reports show how access can fail. In August 2020, 1.2 million migrant workers in Saudi Arabia had wages paid late,[69] and charities and embassies handed out millions of meals and food parcels during the pandemic.[75, 76, 77, 78] In March 2026, workers in all six members reported food prices doubling or tripling, pay cuts and unpaid leave.[72] In June 2026 food inflation ranged from 1.0 per cent in the UAE and 1.4 per cent in Saudi Arabia to 12.74 per cent in Qatar.[38, 39, 40]
Shock endurance:
Gulf sovereign wealth funds hold about US$4 to 5 trillion, so governments can outbid almost anyone when food is short.[32] Food reserves are deep too. Saudi Arabia had at least six months of wheat in March 2026, the UAE reports four to six months of supplies, and Qatar's government claims 18 months.[12, 13, 20] Qatar can store about 320,000 tonnes of grain, and a port terminal with 51 silos and 300,000 tonnes of space was 98 per cent complete in June 2026.[21, 22]
Reserves cover 15.1 months of imports in Saudi Arabia, 9.0 in Kuwait, 6.7 in Qatar, 5.2 in the UAE, 3.7 in Oman and 1.4 in Bahrain.[46] Bahrain has the thinnest margin. Saudi and UAE reserves were about US$464 billion and US$238 billion in 2024, against US$5 billion in Bahrain.[47]
The 2017-21 blockade of Qatar showed how fast production can respond when supply is cut. Before June 2017 Qatar imported about 400 tonnes of milk and yoghurt a day from Saudi Arabia. By 2020 it produced 106 per cent of its own dairy needs, from 230,000 tonnes of milk.[23, 24]
Farms abroad and Gulf-owned traders add another buffer. SALIC's Continental Farmers Group farms about 200,000 hectares in western Ukraine and grows more than a million tonnes of grain a year. Al Dahra farms about 400,000 hectares in 17 countries.[26, 27] These give the Gulf more ways to get food than buying on the open market.
Estimates of Saudi food cover range from about four months to at least six.[46] But money cannot move cargo through a closed strait, which leaves Kuwait and Bahrain most exposed. Bahrain has only 1.4 .[46] Protein supply across the Gulf is 100.2 grams per person a day, about 70 per cent more than people need.
Trajectory
A minimum wage for migrant workers in Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Oman,[61, 62, 63, 64] and a rule that Qatar's employers report food allowances through the wage protection system,[59, 65] would help households.
The change that matters most is building ports and routes outside Hormuz. Gulftainer's Khor Fakkan expansion is funded and under way. DP World is in talks with the UAE government over a new port and container terminal at Fujairah, though ownership and funding were not settled by July 2026.[17, 18] Every tonne unloaded outside the Gulf gives importers another route when Hormuz is closed. Gulf-owned grain trading is already growing. The Olam Agri deal gives Riyadh a business that buys, trades and ships grain under its own control.[25, 26] Money also keeps flowing into greenhouses and fish farms. They add protein slowly, and they use more electricity and desalinated water as they grow.[8]
The Gulf will keep importing most of its food, because it lacks the land and water to grow it. Turning imported feed into meat, eggs and milk with desalinated water keeps its food production dependent on foreign supply.[1, 9] Its real protection is money, reserves and the ability to reroute cargo quickly, all at high cost.
Country notes
Saudi Arabia. The only member with real depth. It moved grain to its Red Sea ports during the closure and has the Gulf's largest dairy and poultry farms.[4, 5, 13] Its wheat programme ended in 2016 after draining ancient aquifers. SALIC's Olam Agri business extends its control of supply abroad.[7, 25]
United Arab Emirates. Rich and the Gulf's shipping hub, but Jebel Ali sits inside the Gulf. DP World suspended work there on 1 March 2026.[15] On 14 March Iran named Jebel Ali, Khalifa and Fujairah in a warning to evacuate, and debris from a drone shot down over Fujairah started a fire.[16] The move to east-coast ports is the Gulf's fastest adaptation. Weekly container traffic at Khor Fakkan rose from 8,000 to 65,000 TEUs, and a US$2 billion expansion is under way.[17] Food stocks cover four to six months, and Al Dahra supplies fodder and grain from about 400,000 hectares abroad. Against that, the UAE has 15 cubic metres of renewable freshwater per person a year and relies almost entirely on desalination.[8, 12, 27]
Qatar. The 2017-21 blockade sped up Qatar's dairy expansion. It produced 106 per cent of its dairy needs by 2020, starting from 400 tonnes of imported dairy a day, with a herd founded on about 10,000 Holsteins brought in during 2017 and 2018.[23, 24] Doha claims 18 months of food reserves, with about 320,000 tonnes of grain storage and a 51-silo terminal at Hamad Port.[20, 21, 22] But it lies wholly inside Hormuz, and its cows eat imported feed in barns cooled by gas power. Its resilience is bought and stored, not grown.[6, 10]
Kuwait. The member with least water, at 4 cubic metres of renewable freshwater per person a year. It lies wholly inside Hormuz, produces little food and has protein supply of 100.3 grams a day.[2, 8] The Kuwait Investment Authority's assets of about US$1 trillion give it buying power it cannot use while the strait is shut, and it now relies on roads through Saudi Arabia.[32] Kuwait does not publish its food reserves.
Bahrain. An island wholly inside Hormuz, with arable land on less than 5 per cent of a very small territory, about 75 cubic metres of renewable freshwater per person a year and the smallest financial buffer in the Gulf.[8, 9] Its protein supply of 108.2 grams a day is the second highest in the Gulf and the most reliant on animal foods, at 57 per cent, though most of it is imported.[2] In practice its food supply depends on Saudi Arabia and the King Fahd Causeway.
Oman. The best-placed member, despite modest wealth. Its coast faces the Arabian Sea, so Salalah, Duqm and Sohar avoid Hormuz entirely. It is the Gulf's only large net fish producer, producing 146 per cent of its fish needs in 2025 on ministry figures.[34] Omani ports took in diverted ships in 2026, so money is its main limit. Its protein supply of 92.8 grams a day is the lowest in the Gulf and still well above what people need.[2]