Oman has launched its National Spatial Strategy, a major initiative which aims to develop the sultanate’s future planning system, a report said.

The Supreme Council for Planning is overseeing the preparation of the Oman National Spatial Strategy (ONSS) with Consatt Oman as main consulting engineer, added the Gulf Base report.

The project aims to arrive at a land use framework for development at the national and regional levels. It will incorporate regional strategies for all governorates and policies for the implementation of the ONSS based on the goals and objectives of Oman Vision 2020, the report said.

“The ONSS project is about building Oman’s future planning system and shaping the strategic directions of the sultanate,” the Supreme Council for Planning was quoted as saying in the report.

“The ONSS project includes: the preparation of highly significant plans and reports; the design and implementation of a national GIS (geographic information system)-based planning information system; the progressive introduction of new land use planning rules and processes; and the design and initiation of capacity building programmes. This alone makes the ONSS project one of Oman’s largest, most complex and most significant spatial planning projects,” it added.

The project is being undertaken in four distinct phases, all of which — save for one — are the responsibility of Consatt Oman.

The exception is a component that requires the preparation of Regional Spatial Strategies covering all 11 governorates of the sultanate. The governorates are distributed under four contracts currently under tender.

A number of consultancy firms that have been prequalified by the Supreme Council for Planning are participating in the tender for these contracts, the report said.

The successful bidders will be required to prepare regional spatial strategies, as well as contribute data to a proposed National Transport Survey.

The contract awards will result in the preparation of 11 separate regional spatial strategies — one for each governorate.

Each regional spatial strategy will focus on matters of significance to the region, matters requiring decisions to be made about policies, programmes and investments — their priority, timing, scale, location and so on — either at the regional level or on the initiative of, or with the input of, the region, according to the report.