Image used for representation.
DOHA: A new company having stocks of all local farmers will be established soon with prime objective to market local agricultural products, said an official.
The company will focus on unifying the efforts by creating an entity to deal with the authorities concerned on behalf of 1,400 farmers in the country, said Sheikh Dr Faleh bin Nasser Al Thani, Assistant Under-Secretary for Agriculture and Fisheries Affairs at the Ministry of Municipalities and Environment.
Speaking with media persons on the sidelines of an event recently, Al Thani said that main role of new company will be marketing of local agricultural products.
He said that there are about 1,400 local farms which are producing agricultural products that are enough to meet the demands of local market adding that what is needed to make a plan to increase the production not to increase the number of farms as only 30 percent of these farms are being utilised.
He said that currently many agricultural products were meeting 100 percent demands of local market notably tomato that crossed the self-sufficiency demand of the country therefor a complete marketing strategy was needed. The Ministry of Municipality and Environment is going to launch many projects under food security programme, said the Assistant Under-Secretary for Agriculture and Fisheries Affairs.
“The Ministry is about to implement prawn farming project as the deadline for companies to submit their proposals is going to expire by end of this month to start the process for awarding the tender for the project,” he added.
Sheikh Dr Faleh bin Nasser Al Thani, Assistant Under-Secretary for Agriculture and Fisheries Affairs at the Ministry of Municipalities and Environment.
“A number of projects to produce green fodders will be launched soon,” he said adding that the country is about to meet the self-sufficiency in dairy and poultry products therefor the issuance of licenses for such projects had been stopped.
He said that now the new projects would focus on marketing and processing of local products to manage the growing products and those already in surplus. “The surplus products will be processed and packaged for a better utilisation for the market.”
Regarding export of Qatari products, he said that a number of local products were being exported and with establishment of food processing units, the export opportunity would increase manifold.
Regarding the prices of local products, he said that Qatari market was being ruled by supply and demand and the State did not interfere in this regard.
The official said that the authorities concerned cooperated in reducing the role of middlemen between farmers and consumers that contributed in reducing the prices of agricultural products.
