Saudi Arabia v Iran: Who is more powerful?

Regional rival Saudi Arabia and Iran are directly or indirectly fighting against each other in the Middle East. Two countries compete with each other in the global oil trade. Which of these two countries is stronger than trade and military power? Al Jazeera has tried to answer this question.
Military spending
In the past five years most of the countries in the Middle East have been directly or indirectly engaged in armed conflict. 32 percent of the world's total registered arms imports are in this region. Saudi Arabia's military spending budget is quite big. It is difficult to determine the extent of Iran's military expenditure. But Radio Ferdar says the country's annual military spending is $ 700 billion. On the contrary, Saudi Arabia spent $ 56 billion in military spending each year. This expenditure does not include the new agreement of the Saudi and the US. Saudi Arabia spent $ 300 million on those two agreements.
According to a report by SIPRI in 2017, Iran has imported four defense systems from Russia. The imposition imposed on this imported country was not under sanctions.
United States of America's main supplier of weapons in the Gulf region. In addition, almost 50 percent of the UK's total arms exports can go to Saudi Arabia. Most of these weapons are being used in the ongoing war in Yemen, Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia is the lion's share of arms imports from the US and European countries.
Economy
Iran: Iran's economic growth was 7.4 percent in 2016-17 fiscal year. Which is more than the previous year. The International Monetary Fund has revised that the rise in growth is due to the increase in oil production in the country. Tehran's financial sector analyst Naveed Kolhar agrees with this preamble. He added, the rise in hydrocarbon trade is the mystery of the economy's trends It is doubtful that 1 percent of the total growth from oil sector is available outside the oil sector. The main driving force of this economic growth is the export of Iran, especially in the Asia market.
But despite this growth the economic complexity is in Iran. There are still weaknesses in the economic structure of the country. In 2016, inflation was reduced to 9.5 percent. As the oil-based economy is concerned, this growth can not be said to have increased the employment opportunities of ordinary Iranian citizens. The unemployment rate for the last two years has increased by 11.4 percent.
Saudi Arabia: From January 2017 to January 2018, Saudi Arabia's economic growth was negative. Although the country's authorities have taken the initiative to bring diversification to the economy and overcome oil dependence, it still does not bear fruit. 22 percent of the world's oil reserves are in Saudi Arabia. The country has pressurized the OPEC member organizations to increase prices by reducing the production of oil exporting countries. However, the oil fields outside Saudi Arabia are still struggling. According to Bloomberg, this sector's growth was only 0.6 percent.
State-run oil marketing company Aramco is still trying to sell 5 percent of its shares. From this, the country will get 100 billion dollars of cash. This is part of an ambitious project to reduce the oil dependence of the country. This project includes construction of a city at a cost of $ 500 billion along the Red Sea. It is expected that long-term Saudi Arabia's oil dependence will be reduced from this sale.
Oil production
Saudi Arabia: According to OPEC data, oil-rich country is the world's main mineral export exporter. About half of the country's GDP is met from oil and gas exports. In addition to minerals, Saudi Arabia exports natural gas, gold and copper. Every day the country extract 1 million barrels of oil. Domestically, the country consumes three million barrels. The rest of the oil is exported. Despite being the world's largest oil exporter, Saudi Arabia and other OPEC countries have reduced oil production to raise oil prices.
The reason for lower oil prices is the increase in US oil production. The country is now lifting more oil than demand. Every day the United States extracted 90 million barrels of oil. For this reason, Riyadh has started expanding and expanding the scope of the economy.
Iran: There was economic sanctions on Iran's oil exports for decades. As a result, the country has been forced to take a number of steps. Still, 80 percent of the country's total exports of oil industry contributed. Today Iran produces 40 million barrels of oil per day. Of these, 18 lakh households demanded.
After the withdrawal of the ban under the nuclear deal in 2015, foreign investors have again been in Iran. From December 2015 to January 2016, Iran's oil exports have increased twice. The country exported 2 million barrels of oil every day. This situation was prevailing throughout the whole of 2017 without the April.
Iran and Qatar have joint ownership of the world's largest natural gas fields outside of oil. It is located in South Pars and North Dome. Iran's 3700 sq km of the Persian Gulf is France's total investment in the natural gas market has been invested by Iran's National Iranian Well Company. The company is helping South Pars development. Every day Iran lifts 88 million cubic meters of gas. By 2021 the country's gas production is estimated to be 120 million cubic meters per day.