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minutes by catamaran from Doha
– offers luxury accommodation and
top-quality international food at its raft
of restaurants and eateries. That’s
why it exclusively imports mussels
from New Zealand, and has had to
adapt with other products since the
blockade. Milk and dairy products
once from South Africa are now
sourced from Turkey and Iran, and
prized foods like smoked salmon once
imported from Dubai now come from
other producers.
‘We love Qatar brands, and the
campaign to use local manufactured
food has been highly successful,”
Mauritius-born Makoona says. “We
now use local farmers wherever
possible, but sometimes we bring in
New Zealand beef and lamb for its
quality. We use zucchini from New
Zealand, and Manuka honey. And we
use Anchor cream and cheese…once
again for its quality.”
Qatari leaders are hoping those imported
foods will one day be replaced
by locally grown. And it’s an attitude
that filters from the top. Qatar’s ambassador
to Moscow Fahad al-Attiyah
says if the price of Qatar’s independence
is to airlift every single pint of
milk, then it will do so. Syrian businessman
Moutaz al-Khayyat has airlifted
thousands of Holstein dairy cattle
from Germany, Australia and the US
to air-conditioned hangars, capable of
cornering 30 to 40% of Qatar’s milk
market; and Gulf Food Production
will start shipping its own cows to a
500,000 sq metre cutting-edge dairy
farm shortly. “We are still working 24
hours a day of maximum capacity to
meet the market,” al-Kuwari says.
Imagine this: thousands of cows in
individual pens in giant warehouses
cooled
by huge
fans and
water sprays
to stave off
the sweltering
heat and humidity.
Each cow is dry-fed,
mechanically milked
on state-of-the-art rotary
machines capable of working 24
hours a day. There’s even a viewing
gallery for Qatari families wishing to
check out the process. And elsewhere
on the vast site, more than
70ha has been flattened for more
livestock sheds.
A pivotal voice in this movement is
Irish farmer John Dore, who runs the
sprawling Baladna farm in the desert
60km north of Doha and is importing
cows from Germany. “The boycott
has been a great thing for Doha in a
way,” he comments. “It has been
a wakeup call to the entire country.
It has made them aware of all the
opportunities that are there, and not
just in farming. Nearly 80% of its
food came from its neighbours. It
sometimes takes war or the threat of
war to make countries look at their
food security.
“If the Blockade was lifted,
there is so much pro-Qatar
sentiment and nationalist
pride that the people
will buy Qatar
milk, not Saudi. I
think the whole
environment
will completely
QATAR
OVERVIEW
One fifth the size of New Zealand,
Qatar is sitting on a goldmine of natural
gas, which is reflected in its status as
having the highest per capita GDP in
the world, at US$104,000. An incoming
FIFA World Cup tournament there in
2022 means infrastructure upgrades
are starting to gather pace. Qatar is
a relatively small peninsula of 11,500
square kilometres, and a population of
around 2.6 million people. There are
fewer than 300,000 Qatari. The Qatar
economy is underpinned by hydrocarbons,
mainly natural gas. Economic
policy is targeted at Qatar’s increasing
private and foreign investment in
non-energy sectors, but oil and gas still
account for more than 50% of GDP,
roughly 85% of export earnings and
70% of government revenues. Qatar
has the third-highest known gas reserves
in the world and also, at current
rates of extraction, some 50-plus years
of oil supply. Qatar’s successful World
Cup bid is accelerating large-scale
infrastructure projects including roads,
a metro rail system and a rail network
which will eventually link Qatar to Europe.
In addition, construction projects
abound as new hotels, office space,
apartments, stadiums and hospitals are
built. The bilateral trade between New
Zealand and Qatar is heavily weighted
in Qatar’s favour. New Zealand exports
are predominately meat and dairy
products and it imports
mainly gas from Qatar
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