Diversification of the economy is imperative to generate jobs in the private sector and one of the goals of Qatar National Vision 2030 is to achieve diversification. Gas will continue to play a much longer role in the life cycle of hydrocarbon industry as it is one of the cleaner hydrocarbons said an expert during the Euromoney Qatar Conference 2022.
Addressing the panel session entitled ‘Global and Qatari macro outlook’, Gourang Hemani, Chief Financial Officer, Qatar Islamic Bank said, “The expansion that is happening in Qatar is very timely. Europe imports roughly as of now 77 billion cubic tonnes of Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) and Qatar is supplying 24 percent of the total, so there is much more room to be able to grow and I think it is a win-win situation for both the regions. Compared to other GCC countries Qatar is in a little bit happier position.
He added, “If you are into the pyramid of hydrocarbons, I think gas is supposed to be one of the cleaner hydrocarbons and gas will continue to play a much longer role in the lifecycle of hydrocarbon industry.”
Alexis Antoniades, Director, Chair of International Economics Georgetown University – Qatar, noted that diversification of the economy is imperative because of the young population, to generate jobs in the private sector and without diversifying you cannot do that.
Addressing the conference Akber Khan, Senior Director, Asset Management, Al Rayan Investment said, “There are number of opposing forces that are pulling each other which investors, central bankers, governments are having to come to turn with. The global pandemic had a significant impact on the global supply chain and had a major effect on the restriction of goods across a broad spectrum of industries.”
Responding to a query about how important it is for Qatar to diversify, he said, “The Qatar National Vision 2030 lays out the States plan to achieve goals in a number of areas and diversification is one of them. Citing example of the Qatar Freezone Authority, Khan noted that it has been successful in bringing number of companies, and also Investment Promotion Agency has been able to bring service providers and manufacturing companies into Qatar through various incentives and initiatives. So, there is work being done from long time in this regard.”
Qatar has been blessed with a significant natural resource that is gas but as a consequence other resource that the country is now blessed with is capital and both of these areas have a very significant competitive advantage. “Just the way that gas has been downstream and vertically integrated in terms of supply chain, so we moved from just selling gas to selling LNG, to producing aluminum, fertilizer, petrochemicals, and this is using the advantage of the chief raw material to diversify the end customer. But the other area in which the industry has not been sufficiently developed is capital. Qatar is a major exporter of capital and that is an area where I think there is a very large opportunity to enhance more of how the capital is invested and utilised,” he added.
