Qatar, Gulf region to benefit from World Cup: bank

Qatar and its Gulf neighbours are set to benefit immensely with the expected spending bonanza from Doha hosting the football World Cup in 2022, an economic report said on Sunday.

Tiny gas-rich Qatar had already announced plans to spend at least 100 billion dollars even before being selected to host the world’s biggest sporting event, the National Bank of Kuwait (NBK) said in a report.

“Hosting the World Cup foremost adds a sense of urgency and an ultimate hard deadline for the completion of the projects critical to a successful hosting,” the report said.

Projects in the pipeline include a 25-billion-dollar metro and rail network, some sections of which will be ready for the World Cup, and a 10-billion-dollar Doha International Airport, the first phase of which will open in 2012.

Other major projects include a deep water port at a cost of seven billion dollars and the four-billion-dollar Qatar-Bahrain causeway. Qatar also plans to spend 20 billion dollars to build and expand roads, the report said.

Projects planned for the World Cup include building 12 state-of-the-art stadiums at a cost of four billion dollars, NBK said.

Qatari officials have also pledged to add 90,000 new hotel rooms before 2022, although FIFA requires the addition of only 65,000 rooms, NBK said.

“Hosting the World Cup will set tight deadlines, create extra spending, bring in new expertise and present additional motivation and incentives,” the report said.

NBK said the whole Gulf region looked set to gain from Qatar 2022’s spillover effects, especially for the scores of contractors in the region.

Some regional companies are likely to join forces to meet extra demand created by Qatar’s World Cup preparations, and intra-regional trade will be boosted, it said.

A good deal of the raw materials involved in the construction of many projects will be sourced from neighbouring countries, and large regional financial institutions would also benefit by sharing in funding, it said.