It goes without saying that footballhas never been just football. Back in 2010, though Qatar hosting the 2022 world cup was denounced for bribery of The International Federation of Association Football (FIFA) officials and incompetence of local football teams, Qataris toasted in celebration of being awardedthe 2022 worldcup. They wentout of their way to spend $229 billion to put on this “most expensive sporting event” In a way, football is used as a gauze to cover human rights and political scolding, a process known as sports washing, a propaganda act using sporting events to try to change public perception. But in the case of Qatar, hosting a sportsevent in hopes of sports washing disclosed the abuse of migrant workers and a bribery scandal.
FIFA is also determined to make big splashes in this year’s world cup Environmentalists have also accused the tournament's governing body of "greenwashing" its environmental claims. FIFA was quickly proven wrong when they made the much-vaunted claim that Qatar would host the "first carbon-neutral World Cup", which will produce some 3.6 million tons of carbon dioxide.
Failing to achieveeither of these objectives, it was questioned: did the QatarWorld Cup “scorean own goal” by hosting an extremely controversial event while being a spendthrift splurging 229 billion dollars?
The short answer is no.
According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Qatar was rankedfifth in the nominal GDP per capita of the world, and its rich oil and natural gas reserves deserve the greatest praise. Its North field is not only the world's largest natural gas field, accounting for 10 percent of the world's known reserves, but it is also easy to extract gas from. Despite the gift underground, Qatar has also invested heavily in natural gas liquefaction technology for export globally. Energy exports attributes to roughly 60% of Qatar's GDP, making oil and gas the cornerstone of its economy.
However, Qatar's economy, like that of its oil-rich neighbors, faces enormous problems. Overdependence, instability, and ephemerality are all descriptions of Qatar's energy economy, somethingthat the current King Hamad of Qatar has long noted. It is no exaggeration to say that
the entire economy is drifting with the volatility of energy prices. Undoubtedly, fossil fuels are the most needed resource today, but in the future, mankind's dependence on fossil energy will eventually disappear. Qatar's economy will be placed in a catastrophic situation. To avoid a tragedy, an extremely ambitious transition plan was announcedin Qatar's development planning report in 2008. And hosting the World Cup is just one part of this transition.
Chief among these goals is the transformation of Qatar into an advanced society, capable of achieving sustainable development by 2030. In other words, to break away from its enriched fossil resources. A perfect example is Qatar’s neighbor-Dubai. Just like Qatar, Dubai is known for its ample crude oil deposit, and it too faces the problem of over-dependence. But unlike Qatar, oil exports now account for less than 13%of Dubai's GDP, so it's fair to say that Dubai is no longer dependent on energy extraction. The key to Dubai's success was urban development. Dubai spent 50 years turning itself from a modest fishing town to a cosmopolitan one. Finance, tourism, and trade now earn billions and billions of dollars for Dubai, and this is the path that Qatar wants to follow.
Qatar's effortsare best reflected in a $229 billion investment. Qatarremains a growing economythat has only recently begun to diversify its economy away from its dependence on oil and gas. They are following in the footsteps left by Saudi Arabia, whose GDP exceeds $800 billion, making $229 billion a not-so-high number. With a GDP of only about $180 billion in 2021, spendingmore than an entireyear's GDP for a soccermatch is clearly out of the question. It is
worth noting that not all of the expenditures are directly related to the World Cup; rather, they are the total cost of building the city of Lusail and rebuilding the infrastructure aroundDoha over 15 years.
The world cup, in this instance, presumably takes the role of bolstering publicity. See, hosting these major international eventsnot only stimulates employment, and tourism,but also enhancesinternational status and visibility. Hosting the World Cup is part of a strategic plan to put Qatar in competition with Dubai as a regional business and tourism headquarters and put itself on the global map as a regional leader, therefore in the national strategy, World Cup simply complements the need for awareness. Over the past 15 years, Qatar has hosted more than 500 international sporting events across all sports and age groups. Among these events, the World Cup takes on as a significant promotional ambassador for Qatar's long-term sustainability goal, which involves the construction of a new city, a new energy economy, and a new worldwide reputation.
As the sound of Argentina winning the title pounds at full blast, let us not forget the biggest winner of the World Cup was not only the champion. While the discourse surrounding this year’s world cup has been filled with solicitude for human right malfeasance and controversies over FIFA’sbig-talk remarks, Qatar’ssustainable accruals have become another matter of widespread concern. It is not hard to realize that it is the fossil energy-dependent countries, the ones who urged for sustainable development. Lusail, on the other hand, proves a possibility of a sustainable city. Though critics have flouted the Qatar world cup and its greenwashing scheme as a “Climate Catastrophe”, there is no doubt that the Qatar World Cup against the old energy economyhas been brought to global attention.
Reference
Boykoff, J. (2022, November 23). The World Cup in Qatar is a climate catastrophe. Scientific American. Retrieved February 10, 2023, from https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-world-cup-in-qatar-is-a-climate-catastrophe/
Walsh, A. (2022, November 21). Is the Qatar FIFA World Cup really carbon neutral? – DW – 11/21/2022. dw.com. Retrieved February 10, 2023, from https://www.dw.com/en/is-the-qatar-fifa-world-cup-really-carbon-neutral/a-63753961
Environment and Sustainability. Government Communications Office. (2022, August 11). Retrieved February 10, 2023, from https://www.gco.gov.qa/en/focus/environment-and-sustainability/#:~:text=Protecting%20the%20environment%20and%20supporting%20sustainable
Qatarenergy - Home. Qatar Petroleum. (n.d.). Retrieved February 10, 2023, from https://www.qatarenergy.qa/en/Pages/Home.aspx