This week’s issue of the Official Gazette included Royal Decree 69/2026 Amending Some Provisions of the Mineral Resources Law. The amendment includes changes to how licences are granted, the conditions for granting a concession, and the penalties for violating the law.
Under the previous law, auctions were only mandatory for concession agreements, and ordinary prospecting and exploitation licences could be granted after the ministry simply verified the applicant’s technical and financial standing. Now, prospecting and exploitation licences must not be granted except by way of auction, though the ministry retains a narrow exception allowing it to assign some mining sites directly.
The previous law required a concession to run for 20 to 30 years, cover at least 5 square kilometres, and be backed by both an economic feasibility study and an environmental impact assessment before it could be granted. The amended law drops all four of these requirements, leaving only the applicant’s technical competence and financial solvency, and the need to specify technical and financial supervision arrangements for the site.
Penalties for illegal extraction have also been simplified. Before, a licensee who deliberately mined outside their own licensed limits actually faced a tougher punishment than someone with no licence at all: imprisonment plus a fine of 50,000 to 150,000 Rial Omani, or just one of the two. Now both offences carry the same fine, 20,000 to 100,000 Rial Omani, but imprisonment of one to three years is compulsory.
These are only some of the key changes made by Royal Decree 69/2026, which enters into force today. You can read it in full in English at the link below:
