The Dubai-based Essa Al Ghurair Investment Co. is considering bidding for four mills in Saudi Arabia which are in the process of being privatized. The purchase is expected to take place within two years.

Dubai’s Essa Al Ghurair Investment Co. is considering bidding for flour mills that Saudi Arabia is preparing to sell to private investors. The plants would add to flour mills it has in Oman and Lebanon, Essa Al Ghurair, chairman of his investment company Essa Al Ghurair Investment, said. The purchase could take place within the next two years, he said, adding that it would not be “difficult to adapt to the Saudi environment.” Saudi Arabia plans to reorganize its nine state-run flour mills into four companies to sell to the private sector. Saudi Arabia’s nine flour mills have combined daily milling capacity of 12,630 metric tons of wheat, and process about 3.3 million tons of wheat a year, according to the USDA’s agriculture specialist in Riyadh. Saudi Arabia’s last wheat farms just stopped production as part of a government effort to save the aquifers supplying them. For the first time, the nation will rely almost completely on wheat imports in 2016, a reversal from its policy of self-sufficiency.