"Since the discovery of oil, the political entities of the Persian Gulf have transformed themselves from desert sheikhdoms into modern states. The process was accompanied by rapid population growth. During the last 50 years, the population of the current Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states: Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Oman, grew from 4 million in 1950 to 33.4 million in 2004, thus recording one of the highest rates of population growth in the world."(...)