Qatar Dragon Mart Group President Zhenguo Huang
By Satish Kanady
DOHA: The upcoming Dragon Mart at the Barwa Commercial Avenue will be a “One Stop Shopping” facility of Chinese products in Qatar. The Mart would be the one and only comprehensive trade platform of Chinese products and enterprises in Qatar.
The estimated turnover driven by the whole platform will be over $5bn during the initial phase. “It is expected to go up the market gradually with the extension of the second phase,” the Qatar Dragon Mart Group President Zhenguo Huang told The Peninsula in an interview.
Qatar Dragonmart Shopping Mall will be the Group’s flagship business. As the first phase, an area of 20,000 sq m has been leased out for the mall alone, he said.
The Qatar Dragonmart Group covers various subsidiaries, including Qatar Dragonmart Management Co, Qatar Dragonmart Logistics Co, Qatar Dragonmart Property Management Co, and China Pacific Construction and Trade WLL.
The Group’s businesses cover commercial and residential property rentals and management, warehousing and logistics, information and financial services and decoration engineering.
Huang said an estimated 300 companies will invest in the shopping mall alone.
All of them will be Chinese companies. The main products available from these outlets would be building materials hardware, furniture, lighting and electronic materials; communications products, textiles and house furnishings.
Huang said the Qatar Dragon Mart Group has been getting all the support from China Business Association and the Chinese embassy in Qatar.
“We hope Qatar Dragonmart would open up a single window for China-Qatar trade. The China Business Association has recommended hundreds of Chinese domestic companies and enterprises to come to invest in Qatar”.
“Qatar Dragonmart will attract lot of competitive Chinese companies and enterprises to come to invest in Qatar. The Group will play a key role in boosting the already growing China-Qatar bilateral trade,” he said.
In a candid remark, Huang said the Dragonmart Group is very much worried about the “undue delay”, in getting the power connection to the space it has already been leased out.
“We were originally scheduled to open our facility on July 1, 2012. But we are facing a huge delay in getting the power connection and the mandatory fitness clearance from the authorities. The delay is causing a huge loss to the group,” he said.
Huang said the Dragonmart was forced to cancel shipments of hundreds of thousands of tonnes of materials and also sent back a large number of workers and a group of engineers.
“We have also been waiting for a drawing from the Barwa to go ahead with our interior design project. The heavy traffic flow to the roads leading to the mart is another major worry,” Huang said. The Peninsula
