RIYADH: Project awards in the Gulf Cooperation Council reached $204.1 billion in the first nine months of 2026, up 2.5 percent from a year earlier, as gas and chemical contracts surged despite the regional conflict.  Kamco Invest’s latest GCC Projects Market Update, based on MEED Projects data, showed third-quarter awards of $47.4 billion, down 37.2 percent from $75.6 billion in the third quarter of 2025.   Gas awards rose 59.9 percent to $13.5 billion, while chemical awards jumped nearly fivefold to $3.5 billion. Saudi Arabia led the GCC with $24.4 billion, followed by the UAE at $15.6 billion and Qatar at $5.2 billion.  The project slowdown comes against a weaker regional economic outlook following the escalation of the US-Iran conflict. The International Monetary Fund said in April that strikes and precautionary shutdowns had reduced oil output by an estimated 13 million barrels a day, while natural-gas output fell by the equivalent of about 3.5 million barrels a day. It cut its 2026 growth forecast for the Middle East and North Africa region excluding Israel and West Bank and Gaza to 1.4 percent, 2.3 percentage points below its October 2025 forecast.  Kamco said that, despite the US-Iran conflict, the outlook for the GCC projects market “has been bolstered in both the short and long term.”  Signs of recovery  Only two of eight sectors — gas and chemicals — recorded year-on-year growth in the third quarter. Construction remained the largest sector at $14.8 billion, although awards fell 44.7 percent.  Qatar’s awards rose 76.1 percent from the previous quarter, with about $5 billion coming from oil projects, while Bahrain recorded a 4.3 percent increase. The UAE’s awards fell 13.5 percent quarter on quarter, but its share of total GCC awards rose to 33 percent from 27.9 percent a year earlier.   Saudi Arabia leads  Saudi Arabia’s project awards totaled $73.4 billion in the first nine months, down from $79.5 billion a year earlier. Aramco has committed $50 billion to $55 billion in 2026 capital spending and “has already spent $12.3 billion on upstream oil and gas contracts so far in 2026,” Kamco Invest said.  Saudi gas awards jumped 80.1 percent to $6.9 billion.  Major contracts in UAE and Kuwait  ADNOC awarded a $1 billion contract for the Umm Shaif Gas Cap and Surface Pressure Boosting project, helping lift UAE gas awards to $6.2 billion, Kamco said. The contract was part of $6.2 billion in awards by ADNOC and its foreign partners during the quarter.