VENTURE PARTNER QATAR
NEWS & UPDATES

Minister of Commerce & Industry and Acting Minister of Finance, H E Ali bin Ahmed Al Kuwari, and Minister of Finance of Ukraine, H E Sergii Marchenko, co-chaired the second session of the Qatari-Ukrainian Joint Committee for Economic, Commercial and Technical Cooperation, which took place in Kiev, Ukraine from August 31 until September 2.

The Joint Committee’s second session was attended by representatives from several government agencies, including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Municipality & Environment, Ministry of Public Health, Ministry of Education & Higher Education, Ministry of Culture & Sports, Qatar Chamber, Qatar Airways, Qatar Development Bank, Free Zones Authority, General Tax Authority, Qatar General Organization for Standardization, the Investment Promotion Agency of Qatar (IPA Qatar), Qatar Investment Authority, Hassad Food, Widam Food, Baladna and Nebras Power.

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Tech entrepreneurship is a very challenging field, and requires persistence and determination to win over investors as well as customers and end-users, according to Yousef Al Salehi, Executive Director of Qatar Science & Technology Park (QSTP), part of Qatar Foundation Research, Development & Innovation (QF RDI).

Al Salehi was speaking at the fourth edition of Najah Qatari, an annual event focused on championing Qatar’s local entrepreneurial talent, and celebrating the stories of those individuals and businesses at the forefront of the country’s business landscape. Held at Qatar National Convention Center, panelists included key players in the market such as President of Kahramaa, Eng. Essa bin Hilal Al Kuwari and President of Ashghal Works Authority, Dr. Saad bin Ahmad Al Muhannadi, among other high-ranking officials.

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Qatar’s foreign merchandise trade balance, which represents the difference between total exports and imports, showed a surplus of QR19.6bn in July 2021, reflecting an increase of about QR13.3bn or 213.4 percent compared to July 2020. When compared month-on-month, the surplus increased by nearly QR2.6bn or 15.5 percent compared to June 2021, according to preliminary figures released yesterday by the Planning and Statistics Authority (PSA)

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Qatar's budget surplus in the second quarter of the year stood at 3.8 billion riyals ($1.04 billion), the finance ministry said on Thursday.

The world's largest exporter of liquefied natural gas (LNG) generated 50.1 billion riyals in revenues in April-June, driven by higher-than-budgeted oil prices, and the collection of corporate income tax in April 2021, the ministry said in a statement.

Spending stood at 46.2 billion riyals over the three months to June 30, it said.

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The manufacturing industry has contributed over QR10bn to Qatar’s GDP in the fourth quarter of 2020, according to a tweet by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry (MoCI).

The infographics posted on the Ministry’s official Twitter handle also indicate that Qatar added 16 new factories to its manufacturing sector.

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Qatar’s private sector exports exceeded QR1.64bn in February this year compared to QR1.499bn in January 2021, registering a rise of 10 percent, said Qatar Chamber in its monthly economic newsletter released yesterday.

The newsletter featured the trade of private sector in February according to the certificate of origin issued by the Chamber. This increase in private sector’s exports is attributed to the increase of exports through the General Model certificate of origin which increased by 16 percent, Unified GCC model which increased by 38 percent and GSP model which grew by 17 percent.

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All GCC citizens travelling into Qatar can do so provided they take a mandatory pre-travel Covid-19 PCR test 72 hours before arrival, the Ministry of Public Health of Qatar (MoPH) said.

The results will only be accepted from approved Covid-19 testing centres.

Travellers must also download and activate the Ehteraz Application on their phones upon arrival using a local Qatari SIM card.

“The exemption from quarantine applies to GCC citizens entering Qatar through either Hamad International Airport or the Abu Samra land crossing,” MoPH said.

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Total trade between Qatar and the UK rose to reach £7bn in 2020 despite restrictions and various challenges related to the Covid-19 pandemic, according to British ambassador Jonathan Wilks.

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The Ministry of Transport & Communications (MoTC) and Hamad Bin Khalifa University (HBKU) yesterday organised a virtual forum entitled ‘Digitization of SMEs: An Alternative To Survive’. The event introduced SMEs in Qatar to the era of digital transformation. Shifting from decision-based traditional models to data-driven models, the world of business needs to adapt to the new practices to increase its efficiency in a rapidly changing economy. The forum featured speakers from HBKU, and MoTC. It reviewed best international and regional practices in digital transformation using cloud services in the business and introduced a success story from Qatar and Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) challenges and dealing with recent trends in digitization and automation.

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