{"id":5335,"date":"2018-11-01T15:17:31","date_gmt":"2018-11-01T15:17:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/middle-east-and-north-africa\/gsma_resources\/the-mobile-economy-middle-east-and-north-africa-2017"},"modified":"2025-10-14T17:45:50","modified_gmt":"2025-10-14T16:45:50","slug":"the-mobile-economy-middle-east-and-north-africa-2017","status":"publish","type":"gsma_theme_resources","link":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/middle-east-and-north-africa\/gsma_resources\/the-mobile-economy-middle-east-and-north-africa-2017","title":{"rendered":"The Mobile Economy &#8211; Middle East and North Africa 2017"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By mid-2017, there were 365 million unique subscribers across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, accounting for 63% of the population. Global subscriber penetration overtook MENA during the course of 2015. As a result, MENA has fallen behind Asia Pacific to become the second least penetrated region in the world. There is, however, huge variation between countries in the region, from the advanced Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) States where 76% of the population on average are mobile subscribers, to some of the other Arab States such as Comoros, Djibouti and Somalia where less than a third of the population subscribe to mobile services.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By mid-2017, there were 365 million unique subscribers across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, accounting for 63% of the population. Global subscriber penetration overtook MENA during the course of 2015. As a result, &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"template":"","meta":{"image":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/middle-east-and-north-africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/Screen-Shot-2018-11-01-at-11.10.25-AM.png","json":{"gsma_resources_type":"Document","gsma_resources_thumb":"[4288]","gsma_resources_file":"[4287]","gsma_resources_multi":null,"gsma_resources_wgr":null,"gsma_resources_video":null,"gsma_resources_image":"[]","gsma_resources_url":null,"gsma_resources_date":"09-10-2017","gsma_resources_button":"Download"}},"tags":[],"resource_categories":[],"algolia_discover_type":[1997],"class_list":["post-5335","gsma_theme_resources","type-gsma_theme_resources","status-publish","hentry","algolia_discover_type-resource"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v20.9 (Yoast SEO v25.6) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Mobile Economy - Middle East and North Africa 2017 - GSMA Middle East &amp; North Africa<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/middle-east-and-north-africa\/gsma_resources\/the-mobile-economy-middle-east-and-north-africa-2017\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Mobile Economy - Middle East and North Africa 2017\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By mid-2017, there were 365 million unique subscribers across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, accounting for 63% of the population. Global subscriber penetration overtook MENA during the course of 2015. As a result, ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/middle-east-and-north-africa\/gsma_resources\/the-mobile-economy-middle-east-and-north-africa-2017\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"GSMA Middle East &amp; North Africa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-10-14T16:45:50+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/middle-east-and-north-africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/GSMA_logo_colour_web_small.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"300\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"300\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Mobile Economy - Middle East and North Africa 2017 - GSMA Middle East &amp; North Africa","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/about-us\/regions\/middle-east-and-north-africa\/gsma_resources\/the-mobile-economy-middle-east-and-north-africa-2017","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The Mobile Economy - Middle East and North Africa 2017","og_description":"By mid-2017, there were 365 million unique subscribers across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, accounting for 63% of the population. 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