Saturday 09 / August / 2025
Muscat: Only Omanis can now receive licences to operate as street vendors, the country's Ministry of Commerce and Industry has announced.
According to the officials, such a move has been taken to give Omani job-seekers a chance to earn a proper living.
In an online statement, the ministry said, “Licenses of street vendor professions are granted only to Omanis, and expatriate workers cannot be allowed to work in mobile vehicles such as vending machines, juices and ice cream trucks and stalls, and other activities specified by the regulation of street vendors.”
It added, “This comes as part of an agreement with the Ministry of Manpower, the Royal Oman Police (ROP), the Ministry of Regional Municipalities and Water Resources and Muscat Municipality.”
The ministry explained that such opportunities are available to Omanis to earn a living until they have access to other jobs or are able to expand and open their own shops through which the person can obtain foreign labour within the normal business framework and according to the conditions and terms set by the concerned authorities.
The Ministry pointed out that there were many models of mobile vending vehicles and that had become iconic brands of their own, in addition to having branches in different places, which was what was sought by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry in cooperation with Al Raffd Fund and Riyadah.
Article 3 of the regulation of the street vendor profession referred to the conditions of obtaining the licence, the most important of which is that the applicant for the licence should be an Omani citizen. Article 7 confirms that no foreign labour is to be operated or leased or allowed to be used by others.
The data recorded by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry shows that the number of licences for street vendor stood at 398 licences, and the number of domestic work permits reached 6,705 licenses by the end of April 2019.
