Author: Radical_Beetle

Local Produce and Agriculture in Qatar

Post author By Radical_Beetle
Post date November 8, 2022
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The change can be seen when examining Qatar’s development process throughout recent years. Especially comparing it to before the blockade, when Qatar relied on imports from outside the country for a wide range of products and services. Although after the challenge that left Qatar with difficulties in importing necessities for its citizens, they recovered quickly through the expansion of local production companies. Qatar was self-reliant and independent and had an immediate sense of reaction to how to overcome this issue while ensuring the needs of the citizens. This means that Qatar is now self-reliant through agricultural produces as a contributing factor to the country’s growth. Although this raises many concerns in terms of looking into various factors that affect the social and environmental factors in Qatar, this is through the negative changes in climate causing many risks for different reasons. The secondary articles would look at sharing similar concepts with Qatar’s current situation and could be adapted to help improve it. Qatar can be viewed as a country with a vast development speed. However, it also suffers from high levels of pollution. It prioritizes or pays more attention to expanding and improving capitalism than environmental issues. I argue that Qatar should look into different, more eco-friendly strategies when it comes to labor production. In general, that will limit the harm caused to the environment as they need to balance prioritizing the needs of people and how they overuse the benefit that nature provides us through different ways. Through my research plan, I looked into Qatar’s food strategy plan to budding a robust system and an interview with an employee at a large local produce company which allowed me to engage with scholarly articles I will apply to my case study.

The Capitalocene

The first article, “The Capitalocene” by Benjamin Kunkel, focuses on giving a deeper insight into the Capitalocene system that we live in and the connection between humans and nature. He also focuses on the law of cheap nature by Jason. The article highlights how Widespread fossil fuel consumption, being the leading cause of ‘climate change,’ is still profoundly changing the weather by escalating extreme levels of heat while leading to more droughts; progressively, it will end up ruining agricultural output. In relation to Qatar, we can see how it’s the country, and local production companies, based on primary research, are facing struggles with the weather as the summer season is the longest and takes up the majority of the year, making it only harder to deal with the intense waves of heat that are caused by climate change and keep increasing every year. Another concern that this article raises is that Agriculture may perform better than in biodiverse ground conditions. However, there are reasons to be concerned natural soil land area is drying up, and accesses to groundwater is limited which is essential to agriculture, can be completely hard to deal with the current level of harm caused by humans towards the environment. Not only does this cause a climate crisis leading to habitat loss and extinction and other concerns, but this also leads to difficulties to be faced regarding food security and having enough produce for the entire world. With Qatar’s strategic plan to create a robust food security system, they are leading more towards cheap natural labor to provide produce for society without having to rely on a large number of imports compared to the years before the blockade. The text supports my argument as it emphasizes how “Governments and corporations, for their part, have little incentive to slow, much less stop the general destruction. The collective activity of humanity is sapping the ecological basis of civilization – and no collective agency capable of reckoning with the fact can yet be discerned”. In relation to Qatar, we can see how the government and local companies are aware of the effect of climate change and how much damage is caused through labor procedures; although we should switch to “Green arithmetic” thinking as Moore suggest, this simply means that we balance between the society needs and how we act towards nature and what it provides for us.

After oil

Moving the “After oil: Article tackles a similar concept that my case study focused on, which is the process of ensuring Food security and safety in Qatar to produce High-quality products despite the negative approaches used in order to ensure these qualities that allow the buyers to be satisfied with the products. Based on primary research through my Interview with Mr. Ziv, I discovered that as a company, they would like to implement alternatives to technologies that can be more beneficial for both the company and the surrounding environment as a whole. Although due to financial limitations and no government support in this situation, it’s hard to have access to these technologies that are more reliable and sufficient, as this is one of many obstacles that make it harder to look at other energy transmissions. As the article mentions that “This is the epistemological and practical problem of the impasse of fossil fuels—that is, what blocks us from transitioning to other forms of energy—and of the economy locked into its rhythms.”. Although the way Impasse is approached in this article provides us with a positive view of looking into other strategies that are not primarily energy based or that require the use of oil. This article also mentions a variety of reasons that should “Trigger” energy transitions through the global warming trigger that is caused by human action, although acting into the impasse may require us to give up some practices and allow us to fully adapt to the changes despite not knowing the outcome. This can be a risk because it raises many concerns about how certain things will function without the use of oil. One of the intentional transitions that stood out was “sustainability,” as it’s a required factor when transitioning to other energy sources and as a framework that should be applied to stay away from any harm to the environment. Linking it to the food security plan in Qatar, they want to ensure sustainability in terms of wood waste, food transportation, and food quality, and some of them require the usage of energy that creates damage to the environment, meaning that they are apart of energy impasse which holds them back from taking the risk and looking into different alternatives for energy that could be eco friendly while still being productive. As some of these practices require large amounts of fuel, whether it’s storing fertilizers and seeds or improving trade routes, they all have a high reliance on energy fuels, as finding alternatives may not be enough to meet those needs efficiently. At last, the sooner we have the courage to look into other henry forms that are more eco-friendly, the faster we will be able to save our planet and ourselves.

In conclusion, there are many strategies and alternatives that Qatar and local produce companies should look at. In addition, to be courageous to try different forms of energy as the government should focus less on prioritizing expanding capitalism and the economy and pay more attention to the climate crisis that has only been getting worse over time. This could be through funding these companies with technologies that replace the need for fossil fuels, it’s time to take this issue into full consideration, and there is no time to waste since it would also make it easier for these local produce companies to maximize their production thought having to worry about damage towards the environment or high levels of heat.

Local Agriculture in Qatar Uncategorized

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To further enhance our research about local produce and its development in Qatar we interviewed an employer at one of Qatar’s most expert farms that focused on “vertically grown soilless media vegetables”. Through this interview many of the findings were supportive of the argument that Qatar is indeed aware of the obstacles that climate change either brings to our environment or is caused by us and yet there is a little to non cooperation from the government that allows those local produce companies to engage with facilities that not only produced better product but its eco-friendly. The interviewer clearly addresses the obstacles they face that are caused by climate change as he states “ There are two main challenges in the region that all vegetable farmers need to deal with. The first one being the high temperature in the region and second is the dust cloud that blocks the light intensity that the plants need..to grow in the summer here high tech greenhouses with air conditioning are required. However, those are not profitable and require a lot of government subsidies.”, This reveals how the destruction caused by humans towards nature is not only bringing harm to the environment but the quality of products they use as basic necessities of life in terms of food. On the other hand it was interesting to see how the Qatari government dealt with local produce companies as the interview said that “the government does have a guideline on how to protect the environment while producing. in matters of where to get water and how to deal with the waste.” To summarize the Qatari government has been attempting in recent years to expand the number of crop production grown locally. The interview mentions that It’s highly beneficial to the country’s self-sufficiency in terms of food security.

Although as I stated before Qatar should also devote more attention towards the damage created on the environment that is caused through the process of local food supply as for no they are constantly putting themselves as “humans” and their need as a priority and leaving behind the description they have caused towards the environment. Which leads us to the text “The ‘Anthropocene’? Nature and Complexity, this link to my argument of how Qatar and local produce companies deal with nature in a way that brings harm to the environment and in the same time satisfies the need of humans, where we take complete control of the environment and use it in a way to benefit us without paying attention to the destruction we have caused, whether it destroying habits, polluting or any other damages that could affect all living species. Based on the article it argues and emphasizes on human activity for many years behind as history reveals has been not only affecting the environment in terms of climate change but the formation and the structure of rocks as a whole, as this is where the understanding of the anthropocene concept comes in as humans believe that they can treat nature however they want without dealing with the consequences. At last linking it back to the interview the employer mentions that one of the challenges is how during the summer it’s hard to continue their farming procedure due to high levels of temperature and dust within our region and it’s known that the temperature has only been getting worse throughout the years. This issue requires serious attention more than the past and should always be taken into consideration with new developments moving forward.

Local Agriculture in Qatar Uncategorized

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Examining Qatar’s National Food Security Strategy from 2018 to 2023.” It aided me in broadening my research and developing my argument as to whether Qatar is cautious of or incorporates the environmental damage as well as how well they ensure food security. As a country with a high rate of pollution, Qatar prioritizes or devotes more attention to capitalism than to ecological issues. Through my research and study of these local documents, I discovered that the Qatar national food strategy plan from the food security department, demonstrates that Qatar tries to minimize environmental harm, whether it is food waste, climate issues and ensures food security. Some of the aims that this department has set are through “guaranteeing that trade routes are varied enough to limit risk exposure, progressing food from the port, helping to ensure that food losses and waste are minimized), with regulatory requirements that promote competition and product liability, and having adequate a sensible reserve capacity to serve as a backup in moments of crisis, both for inputs (water, seeds, fertilizer) and outputs (food products). Researchers also aim to efficiently cultivate crops such as livestock and fish inside the bounds of Qatar’s natural resource base to guarantee a reliable source of decomposable procedure in critical situations.” As they also provide a framework that allows local produce companies to balance their production while minimizing environmental destruction.

This all confirms that Qatar appears to be trying to restrict and inefficient agricultural practices via different approaches that various departments partnered on to formulate a complete plan to tackle this issue. As I would now argue that Qatar is indeed aware of the damage created on its environment and they are improving the agriculture produce although they have to start taking action in terms of practicing and implementing their food strategy plan as only minor changes can be observed in which they are still focusing on expanding capitalism. Linking it to the “After oil” Article as we are now living and experiencing petroculture, where we can see the shift in our society and how the power of fossil fuels and the advantages it brings to our country. This article raises an important argument that would fit the current situation in Qatar which is to transition to different sources of energy that don’t revolve around fossil fuels. As in Qatar local produce companies use fossil fuels for many different reasons whether it’s for a labor machine that produces food products or even the packing used for tour food they all require large amounts of fossil fuels. Therefore using more reliable and environmental energy sources will allow those local companies to minimize the damage they cause towards the environment and have a safer approach to food security as well.

Local Agriculture in Qatar Uncategorized

Blog post 1

With Qatar’s recent developments in its capital and economic factor and after facing various obstacles the country has faced after the blockade from the neighboring countries and seeking its independence, Qatar decided that expanding capitalism and local produce would be one of the best options to rely on themselves. Looking into a text that shares the same concepts with Qatar’s current situation is the article “The Rise of Cheap Nature” by Jason Moore. This text focuses on introducing what cheap nature is in our world and it’s simply everything revolving around food, labor-power, raw materials and energy, as the text also emphasizes on increasing level of labor productivity and capitalism which is exactly what Qatar is going through for the past few years as a way to be more stable and independent. A question that this article made me raise about Qatar’s current citation is whether the damage that is caused towards the environment as a whole by cheap nature is being treated or payed attention too or not especially in a country like Qatar who has high level of pollution and prioritizes or pays more attention to capitalism in comparison to environmental issues that should be looked at.

The issue is not about whether Qatar is addressing or aware of these issues but the real problem is whether they are doing enough and coming up with solutions to balance out the damage caused. A possible solution to start with that could help and minimize the damage is that Qatar should come up with stricter laws and rules to implement on anything that revolves around cheap nature in order to regulate and minimize the damage done and as the article says the shifts that occur in the environment due to high productivity labor need taken into consideration and look at it form different views. It’s clear that Qatar’s focal point in the beginning was to expand and improve its capitalism as much as they can in order to profit from it and fulfill the needs of the society, although over time the high levels of pollution and its effect started showing more and harming the biodiversity system. Especially with Qatar’s well known weather due to its location where the temperature level is very high most of the time during the years which makes it even more difficult and complicated to deal with the ongoing environmental crisis and climate change. An example to look at is Baladna which is the largest local producer company in Qatar where it’s a part of Qatar’s plan on expanding it’s capitalism and labor, and most importantly stop relying on other countries to import any sort of products. In further research I would like to study the different approaches and techniques that Baldana and other similar companies use in order to minimize any harm to the environment and what is the government role in this situation.