Common currency for the Gulf states by 2010

Bahrain's minister of finance Abdullah Hassan Seif has announced that the finance ministers at the six states of the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) decided last Saturday to unify their country's currencies by the end of 2010 and set an earlier date for the common custom tariff from the year 2005 to the end of 2003.

The GCC ministers also approved the amended formula of an economic agreement signed in 1991 towards maintaining integration among the economies of the 6 states.

The Bahraini minister said that the GCC ministers agreed to start the implementation of a law pertinent to united customs tariff, as from January 2002.

It was also agreed to correct the customs tariff and making it 5%. Seif explained that this process will start as from the year 2002 and should be completed by the year 2003.