UAE ranks top in MENA on QS World Future Skills Index
UAE ranks17th globally in World Future Skills Index, leads Arab world
#UAE #education - UK-based higher education analytics firm QS (Quacquarelli Symonds) has ranked the UAE 17th out of 89 economies in its QS World Future Skills Index 2027, the top rank from the Middle East and North Africa. The UAE scored 86.5 overall, leading the MENA region on Skills Alignment (83.8) and Academic Readiness (85.0). The Emirates was also ranked third globally by the Index on Economic Transformation (98.9), behind only China and Taiwan. Saudi Arabia followed as the region’s third-highest scorer at 34th globally with a score of 72.1, with the report crediting the country’s push to diversify beyond oil and gas into renewables, mining and space technology.
SO WHAT? - The Economic Transformation score outpacing its Skills Alignment score tells a story about the UAE economy. The Emirates’ economic growth is moving faster than the domestic pipeline of job-ready graduates can keep up with. That’s not unique to the UAE, the report flags the same pattern globally, but it matters most in economies making the biggest AI-driven leaps. Fortunately, in recent years the country has become a magnet for global AI talent and so it is the combination of foreign and home-grown talent that powers the UAE’s fast-growing AI ecosystem.
KEY POINTS:
UK-based higher education analytics firm QS (Quacquarelli Symonds) publshed its QS World Future Skills Index 2027.
The UAE ranked 17th out of 89 economies globally with a final score of 86.5, the highest ranking for any MENA economy in the Index.
The UAE topped the MENA region in Skills Alignment (83.8), a score comparable to India (82.7), which led South Asia, and well above the MENA regional median of 40.3.
The UAE also led MENA in Academic Readiness with a score of 85.0, close to India’s 86.7, and above the regional median of 61.9.
The UAE ranked third globally in Economic Transformation with 98.9, behind only China and Taiwan, and was the only MENA economy in the global top 10 for this indicator.
Saudi Arabia ranked 34th globally with a score of 72.1, the third-highest in MENA after the UAE and Israel (23rd, 80.4).
The report describes Saudi Arabia as an Over-Converting Economy, turning a comparatively weaker academic base into stronger economic output through coordinated industrial policy, foreign-talent integration and technology transfer.
Saudi Arabia is cited as moving beyond its oil and gas base, using its universities’ research strengths to build industrial advantage in renewables, nuclear, mining and space technology.
The Index ranks the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Qatar and Jordan as the top five economies in the Arab World.
The United States topped the global index with a score of 99.2, followed by Australia (97.5), the United Kingdom (96.5), Germany (95.5) and Canada (93.7).
ZOOM OUT - Ranking 89 national economies, the QS World Future Skills Index 2027 found that AI is widening gaps between countries rather than disrupting them evenly. Five findings stand out: skills gaps persist globally even as some economies close them through targeted policy; an economy’s mix of AI-augmented versus AI-automated jobs will shape its long-term competitiveness; strong universities alone don’t drive growth without close coordination between higher education, industry and government; higher education is changing too slowly to match the pace of workplace transformation, frustrating employers; and smaller economies like the Netherlands and Singapore are proving that specialisation, not scale, can deliver outsized rankings.
[Written and edited with the assistance of AI]
Source: QS World Future Skills Index 2027
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