Self Reliance in Qatar has become a prominent aspect after being blockaded by neighboring gulf countries. This ultimately led Qatar to become more dependent on producing locally. New agricultural businesses like Baladna arose to begin producing necessary foods. Qatar was able to act quickly to annihilate a short supply of products locally, and prices for other dairy products rose before the opening of Baladna. Before Qatar grew to become self-sufficient its food production was merely from abroad, but that changed quickly. This was a moment of pride as the people were able to see products being made upfront in Baladna. It’s critical to acknowledge that even with the arising social benefits behind the scenes, there is a relationship between the local/national and global/ transnational. Qatar was able to be self-dependent, but before being so, the country had to import cows from abroad so that there would be a consistent supply of dairy products produced locally. This portrays the ideas of slow food as it promotes cultural and environmental aspects and deterritorialization in Qatar as a way to guarantee food security through a modern take.
Slow Food, Low Tech in Qatar:
Although Qatar has proven great lengths of success with producing locally and very efficiently, it is critical to unveil that it is not as easy as it looks. Qatar struggled in the past to grow its local food industry because of a lack of nutrient-filled soils, technologies, and other areas. This forced Qatar to depend on having fertilizers sent from other Middle Eastern countries as well as having them import food from their own local produce. This made Qatar’s own local produce be very limited in markets and wasn’t bought very often before the blockade in 2017. When really analyzing the pattern of Qatar’s growth after the pandemic, it looked like a fast recovery action, despite requiring many steps to fulfill that. This is extremely similar to the argument Allison Carruth makes in her text “Slow Food, Low Tech”. She emphasizes the complexity that comes with trying to improve ecological diversity and cultural aspects when dealing with certain environmental issues. Carruth criticizes there are problems with the slow food motions, she is skeptical of the idea of a sustainable agriculture system and slow food production. In Qatar, It is considered a slow food production but with the immense help of technology, labor, and fertilizers that are imported from overseas. This indicates that there is a local and national relationship with Qatar’s agriculture, as they tend to require help from abroad to keep up with local produce. It is not critical to be preserving local foods as much as we assume. For example, locals in Qatar have a mixed preference for what they would purchase in the grocery stores, some would prefer organic foods (which are not local) and some explicitly go to the grocery store to find locally manufactured foods.
During the blockade, many locals mentioned that they are proud to see local produce in the markets, that they chase any opportunity they get to consume them, and that it is also a cheaper product compared to imported produce. But others suggested that they go to certain markets such as Monoprix in order to get the produce from abroad. When analyzing it, there is an ironic sense to it in a way, Qatar’s food cannot be fully seen as local produce because it does receive help from countries about to be manufactured. This is not in any way demeaning how local produce is being made but rather portrays the relationship that local produce has on transnational networks. Without these networks, Qatar wouldn’t be able to have local produce regularly, to begin with. Additionally, the concept of urban political ecology is present in Carruth’s essay, she discusses that slow food has its security issues arguably that is seen in the context of Qatar during the blockade. Carruth discusses the concept of ecological security isn’t solely a local matter but rather a more global aspect that should be intertwined within countries. The quality of food doesn’t necessarily mean it’s worse if it comes abroad but some tend to see it as unclean. The concept of globalization through agribusinesses appeared in Qatar’s implementation of their own dairy-producing farm, to start the business they needed cows immediately. Which led them to import cows from countries like Australia and Germany in an attempt to have guaranteed food security that will benefit the community. To this day it proves that social benefits are crucial in forming a bond between people and agriculture, which is why Qatar has opened the doors of the Baladna Farm for anyone to enter to witness production itself. This doesn’t only enhance Qatar’s economy but preserves its culture and biodiversity.
Deterritorialization in Qatar:
Generally, there is a negative connotation with the concept of deterritorialization, but Heise looks at how it is a positive aspect of the environment. She focuses on becoming a citizen of the world by being able to delocalize an environment and feel restrained about a certain area.
Heise argues that there should be an emphasis on how communities and individuals are tied together with the areas that they inhabit and that a subtle understanding of the emphasis on environmental aspects of local areas is a product of international and global forms. Many environmentalists think that local implications should be more represented. However, Heise proves otherwise, there should be a de-localized value in aspects to give a more well-rounded view of what an environment really consists of. Deterritorialization has enriched society with more modern and higher mobility and altered local industries that benefit the social, cultural, and economic aspects. Deterritorialization is executed in Qatar as mentioned in the previous paragraph by importing materials that are required to enhance Qatar’s environmental system. Materials are necessary for the growth of plants, technology, and labor, all of which portray the sense that Qatar is a privileged country that is affected by deterritorialization.
Heiss also mentions that even though there is cultural and social uproar there is also a critical side of deterritorialization and there are fast effects that delocalization and global influences have on the day-to-day lives of communities. This is a structure seen in Qatar’s approach to creating Baladna in Qatar, these agricultural farms are seen everywhere else in the world, but Qatar needed a political shock like the blockade in order to widen their prospects. By bringing in cows and technologies from abroad Qatar is now in full control over its dairy and food production. They can rely on themselves on how much they should produce based on how much is being consumed. Baladna overall proves the values that it is a local and transnational business that emphasizes the idea of deterritorialization. This is because most of the produce is sold in Qatar’s markets, but a percentage of the products are also being exported. This shows how Qatar was influenced by bringing in cows from abroad, but now is proceeding to extend their agribusiness by supplying across national borders, therefore raising the success of the farm business. Again proving Heisses argument that having de-localized values comes with great opportunities that venture into having a more modern take on the environment.
To conclude, Qatar is a great example of how the relationship between the local/national and global/ transnational is required for a country to be self-sufficient. With the blockade as a shifting movement moment, Qatar has undergone several procedures in order to be stable and enhance its economy. Local agribusiness was made which promoted social benefits for locals to gain a connection with the environment. Overall, it was important to acknowledge that the country’s independence, including help from abroad, and importing resources, materials, and technologies all played a role in creating food security locally.
Category: Local Agriculture in Qatar
Qatar’s self reliance through agricultural produces as a contributing factor to the country’s growth.
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Blog post 3
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.
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Blog post 2
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.
Baladna plays a crucial part in dairy production in Qatar, part of the growth of Baladna came from having a local farm located in the north of Qatar (Al Khor). Due to lack of time I wasn’t able to go experience the Baladna Farm myself, I took it upon myself to Interview a couple of people that did attend the farm. Most said they went to the farm to have breakfast where all the food was made from local Baladna products. I asked them if they were able to see the factory producing the dairy, to which one replied “Yes, we could, there were modules of cows too. On one area of the farm, we were able to milk the cows ourselves which was fun and out of the ordinary.” Having experiences like this makes locals feel closer to the products that they are eating. This is a social benefit as people can see how their dairy products are being manufactured. However, the interviewees also mentioned that “Although this was an enlightening experience to milk the cows, it could be a health precaution as the cows are being milked by people outside of the factory, which means they could have unsanitary hands or unnecessary germs that come with the produce. Another Interviewee said “It was a very different experience to what we are used to, when going to the farm it felt like a different world. I think it’s because we’re so used to urban life we forget the small things like the beauty of the environment’s structure”.
Naess’s “The Third World Wilderness and Deep Ecology” discusses the western view of wilderness in third-world countries. The key argument is that third-world countries will be evicted from their homes as a reason to make more room for species. Even though all mankind lived in the wilderness in a sense. There is the concept of rich countries being the countries that have deep ecology regimes and they can “afford” the luxury of the wilderness in their nations. I recognize that it’s a big jump to discuss deep ecology with the topic of the introduction of Baladna in Qatar. However, what aspect I am delving into is the concept of development in the agricultural sense. An issue was found in the nation of Qatar, the shortage of dairy products after the blockade and how it is a part of citizens’ desires to consume these products. But ultimately a solution was found, this could be linked to the idea that being a rich country with luxuries in hand is beneficial in acting fast in such situations. Qatar imported cows from abroad and created a new agricultural farm that boosted the economy. Which was critical in making a change and thinking fast to get more cows into Qatar to be placed on a farm to produce.
Why I related this to the text is because Naess suggests that Third World Countries tend to live in deserted areas and “subsistence agriculture” is imposed on them. Gary Synder’s formulation was mentioned in the essay, He believes that the misplacement and the invasion of species are letting the poor not be able to reach economic progress and for the richer countries to be more focused on the urbanization of these countries. By turning these areas in Qatar into agricultural farms, it is not only enabling economic progression but also a better use for the environment. Therefore creating Agricultural farms and moving species into them is not always threatening as the writer suggests. One critique I will say however is how Qatar is seen as a Third World country but also one with a fast economic development, which made Qatar rich and thriving in a short period due to oil reserves. But with the blockade and the need to rely on itself, Qatar’s economy is boosting as well as its environmental aspects that allow people to create a deeper relationship with the environment.
Qatar’s desire to transform the status of its economy, and become an autocratic state solely dependent on itself following the GCC blockade in 2017 has altered a lot of the ways in which the country handles different domestic sectors such as trade and agriculture. For one, the government has endorsed a large sum of funds for constructing the Baladna factory that produces products ranging from all things dairy and fresh produce (tomatoes, greens, etc…). When examining the climate here in Qatar, it is clearly a desert climate which makes it unsuitable to naturally harbor and produce these agricultural goods, therefore the country has employed foreign scientific methods to alter the state of harvest, one the alternatives was crop conversions and the other is a form “climate-smart agriculture” which artificially mimics the state of foreign climates in greenhouses by altering temperatures, humidity and light exposure. Even though these modes of production have been installed to increase the country’s self-dependency, they pose adverse impacts on the existing desert climate in Qatar. The constant utilization of fertilizers, pesticides, and other forms of toxic farming chemicals may alter soil compositions, increase air pollution, and poison the balance of natural elements in the desert climate such as the amount of nitrogen present in the environment, which would interrupt the natural flow of this particular ecosystem. These undesired ramifications ultimately lead to questioning the concept of the ‘wilderness’. Does the exploitation of the natural desert climate alter the social conception of the idea of a wilderness? To put it quite simply, humans have constructed a perception of natural life over the years that depicts a transparent barrier between human and non-human life, also referred to as the wilderness. The wilderness is believed to possess vast natural and even supernatural qualities that are sacred, and key in instilling this conception of separation between human civilization and nature. When a country like Qatar chooses to industrialize its only form of wilderness (the desert) and utilize as well as negatively exploit it to further its own agricultural and independent progression does it alter that conception of a segregated wilderness? Based on William Cronon’s essay, and his classification of the wilderness, it is clear that the Qatari wilderness will lose its foreign and natural elements the more that Qatar utilizes these environments to industrialize and grow, as he perceives the wilderness to be the antithesis of unnatural modern human civilization, therefore it can become quite difficult to separate the two conceptions of nature/non-nature. On a larger scale, if these unscathed environments and ecosystems were to be exploited and invaded globally, will this hinder the idea of a wilderness? What can be said is that if this were to happen an immense magnitude of industrialization must occur all over the world, especially in areas that are considered extensions of that wilderness such as the Amazon and rainforests. The ever-changing cultural conventions in Qatar may soon take a turn to separate the idea of a wilderness and depict its natural desert environment as an extension of their urbanized cityscape and their industry, which is a rather interesting development to Cronon’s original idea of “the wilderness”.
When attending different grocery markets in Qatar, there are some markets like Monoprix and Mega mart who rely most on imported produce rather than products that are locally produced. But when I took it upon myself to see markets like Al Meera, more local produce like vegetables were produced in Qatar. Although there is an environmental agricultural problem in Qatar previously that suggested Qatar’s geographical location is not fit for produce, Qatar’s produce is thriving in the markets. To find answers on whether or not the people of Qatar prefer locally produced or imported goods I asked different people at Monoprix and Al Meera. It was evident that people that go to Monoprix purposely go to get French products, not necessarily vegetables or fruits. A handful of people said the produce from abroad was “more flavorful”, whereas others believed that local produce are “fresh and are likely to be stored longer”. The questions were distributed amongst Qataris and non Qataris just to avoid a sense of bias within this research. When examining the produce in Almeera, more products were Qatari products, like tomatoes and cucumbers. Monoprix products were mainly from Jordan and Morocco and Belgium. A particular interview with a Qatari woman in Almeera suggested that she would prefer foods from Qatar for a number of reasons, the first being that she justifies Qatar produce as more “trusting”, she is concerned about the genetically modified foods that come from abroad and what that can do to ones body. She also claimed that Qatar food is more fresh just like everyone else interviewed.However, within this study I asked the people if they think Qatar’s produce is a problem and most said that it never occurred to them to be in a situation where there would be a shortage of produce, but due to our geographical location it could be understood differently by outsiders.
This study reminds me of environmentalist Guhas text “Radical American Environmentalism and WIlderness Preservation: A Third World Critique”. His text argues the critique the west has on third world countries and their ecology, in simpler terms the involvement of politics has a major contribution within the environment. His text argues that anthropocentrism and biocentrism differentiation is what showcases the issues of environmental degradation in the third world.Given that Qatar is considered a part of the Southern Hemispheres “Global South” this would immediately categorize them as part of the Third world countries. With Qatar being a very hot country, the issue of production is also something that the west would fit us into being a country that suffers from lack of produce, hence requiring the west to step in and help. Although the west could see our issue of produce as something that limits us, Qatar still finds different solutions that contribute to food production being effective. Solutions such as getting soil from abroad, produce from abroad and fertilizations too.
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My case study will be looking at Qatar in a more Eco-Marxist perspective, Qatar’s had exposure to oil as an energy source, leading to more labor implementations resulting as well as the increased sense of capitalism. However, with this industrialization also comes an increased level of environmental pollution, as more factories are present to better Qatar’s economy. Qatar tends to prioritize their need to better the environment, which is why new forms of agriculture are embedded into Qatar’s culture. Henceforth, Qatar is now familiar with planting more trees in Education City, parks and deserted Sites. Alongside being a more independent country, Qatar strives to have local produce through farms such as “Baladna” which is the main source of dairy and food produce currently. With this produce farm being a highly demanded market, enters the term “capitolence” which Kunkel introduced in his text. Capitalism will naturally exist always and will always be present unless humans no longer exist, which is why as humans we are used to hearing about capitalism. Additionally, like the complexity of the ecosystem there is also a complexity of the labor system, add them both together and it creates an even more problematic system. Which in turn would define the environmental system as a more capitolecene than an Anthropocene. This is seen in Qatar as mentioned due to the desire to continue growing the economy, having a more green environment, as well as a clean green political mindset.
Other than environmental economic aspects being taken care of by leading authorities, the people of qatar have also engaged in numerous projects willingly in order to become a part of the environmental change. For example, in December of 2019 Qatar tried out a new initiative to plant one million trees all around Qatar. Students like myself voluntarily became a part of this journey. Successfully the country was able to reach the desired outcome of trees planted. This initiative works against the idea of the capitalocene, as this was not an initiative for labor workers to perform but have Qatar’s population take part in enhancing our environment. This in turn almost creates a new sense of life in Qatar, motivating its people to take part rather than create forced labor into migrant workers. This is also aiding Moores claim that what brings together climate, food, work and finance is the fact that capitalism is a common factor within all of these areas. It proves that we live in a capitalist society and that production and power is ever reliant on causing ecological problems. This issue of capitalism in Qatar within the environmental sector should be fixed in order to solve this social, economic and environmental issue. The country can do so by creating more people based initiatives, decreasing labor hours and promoting ways to society that will better their uses/ storage of their products, all of which will decrease the demand of labor.
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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.
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Qatar’s ever growing economy and their extensive routes taken to become a more independent country have become ever so present after the start of the blockade. This immediately led Qatar into facing fast decisions into developing local agriculture practices that will satisfy the needs of consumers locally. Hence the start of the produce company “Baladna”, which is now the main source of dairy and other products locally. With this fast growing successful agricultural project comes along a set of new opportunities as a community socially, economically and environmentally, but there are also disadvantages. On a positive note, there was the economic growth contributed by the Baladna farms, less costs for the country as food imports are needed less, as well as export plans that would benefit Qatar’s economy. Moreover the social benefits, such as being able to see the farms that locally produce our dairy products, the products are fresh as they are local and distributed in a timely manner, Where it also allowed Qatar to prove that its capable of relying on itself and being independent especially after facing the crisis of shortage in many necessities during the start of the blockade but within no time, Qatar was able to overcome this obstacle. However this can also be an issue as there are less food choices as the country is limited to their own food products, as well as the concern of the food quality as they tend to not be as good as crops were when they were imported. When examining these agricultural protocols and practices, specifically the importing of crops, many environmental risks are posed which in turn implicate the country’s economy, culture and autocratic nature. Crop conversion increases the risk of nitrogen pollution within the soil, this happens as a result of over-fertilization and chemical preservation augmenting the concentration of pollutants in the soil and spiking nitrogen levels in said crops. Aside from the emission of ammonia into the atmosphere, nitrogen pollution can alter the domestic environment by adversely impacting the rest of the fertile agricultural land. Qatar has invested its efforts into becoming independent and self-sufficient however the unpropitious environmental circumstances can stand in the way. If practices such as importing crops cause long term impacts on the Qatar’s produce it can limit the country’s economic growth by limiting the natural resources accessible for the country for trade and self sufficiency, obligating the country to resume importing food produced elsewhere. Another adverse effect due to a suffering environment is a decrease in tourism rates, limiting Qatar’s cultural and economic progression. Therefore it is crucial that the country employs self-sufficient agricultural methods while keeping the environment into consideration. A positive method for agricultural self sufficiency that Qatar has employed however is the construction of dozens of greenhouses that only use organic fertilizers and mimic the climates fit for certain crops using innovation and technology. Even though amendments are made to existing methods in favor of the environment, the country’s strategy remains anthropocentric in many ways, as the interests of economic progression, culture and society, and political advancement are at the forefront of their agenda.
