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Agencies
Doha
The economic blockade imposed on Qatar by the Saudi Arabia-led quartet is pushing Brand Qatar to open up further, a report in The Guardian said.
The next plan is to establish the country as the place to do business for companies wanting to trade with Kuwait, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan and Oman, the report said.
Food security has become an essential goal for a country facing a land, sea and air boycott imposed in June by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Bahrain.
If the economy stays afloat, Doha's chances of maintaining its independent foreign policy and forcing the Saudis into a slow, albeit disguised, retreat will be that much better, the report said. As the Doha skyline attests, Qatar is not a country that does things by half measures, and the Baladna Farm's large parent company, Power International Holding, is throwing money at the challenge.
The CEO of Baladna Farm John Dore is importing cows from the US as fast as he can.
The farm plans to supplement its existing herd of 4,000, which is capable of cornering 30 to 40 percent of Qatar's milk market, with a further 10,000 by next summer nearly enough to meet the milk needs of the country's whole population of 2.3 million.
"The boycott has been great thing for Qatar in a way," Dore said."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 percent of its food came from its neighbours.
"The people that have shot themselves in the foot are the Saudis. If the blockade was lifted, there is so much pro-Qatar sentiment and nationalist pride that the people will buy Qatar milk, not Saudi," said the 58-year-old farmer. Self-sufficiency in food is only one test of whether Qatar can withstand the blockade and perhaps even emerge stronger, ready to receive tens of thousands of visitors to the 2022 World Cup.
The Guardian quoted Minister of Finance Ali Shareef al Emadi as saying,"If you look by the second month of the blockade, the trade balance was almost back to the pre-crisis levels. For one month, we had a 40 percent drop in imports, but we quickly adjusted. The whole country has shifted in less than a month."
Yousuf Mohamed al Jaida, the head of the Qatar Financial Authority, said,"Qatar's financial sector has stabilised, new ports, especially in Oman, have helped with the logistics, replacing Jebel Ali in Dubai."
