Qatar is one of the smallest countries in the world and in the Gulf Cooperation Council. Yet it is the richest country in the world. With the highest average salaries in the world, too many foreigners look for job vacancies in Qatar. The population of the country is around 2.6 million people, and around 700 thousand are females. The GDP of the State of Qatar amounted to about $ 192 billion by the end of the year, which means that the share of the Qatari citizen from the wealth amounts to about $ 77,000 annually, which allows the citizens to enjoy their luxury life and the chance to try casino online Qatar in their free time. Beside that, Qatar is investing billions abroad also. In 2005, Qatar investment authority (QIA) was established to manage the country’s investment wealth fund. Having over $338 billion worth of assets around the world, the country is leading the investing business.
Qatar holds many iconic international bands, like Harrods, the UK’s world-famous store, a shareholder in UK bank Barclays and airline group IAG, and many other assets in London and UK in general. The QIA has more assets in London that it has in Qatar itself. Qatar’s investment authority did not invest in the UK but in America as well. One of the heaviest investments in America is the Empire State building, as they hold almost 10% share of the company that owns the building, the Empire State Realty Trust Inc., plus their investment in Uber, with $3.5billion value. This gives them approximately 5% interest in the company. And now they are also opening their office in Silicon Valley to focus more the technological development.
Liquid Gold
Many countries around the world are rich in oil, but not all of them know how to the best profit of it. Unlike those countries, Qatar did amazing work to benefit from its liquid gold. In 2016, OPEC numbers showed that Qatar had 25,244 million barrels of crude oil in reserve and exported around $23 billion worth of petroleum. Having the largest natural gas supplies in the world, Qatar makes tons of money every year.
The gas-condensate field was discovered off the coast in the 1970s. The field is shared between Qatar and Iran, but Qatar exploited the filed with the help of international gas firms to become the world’s largest natural gas exporter. According to OPEC, Qatar exported 130,324 billion cubic meters of liquid natural gas only in 2016. Many companies and countries now export natural gas from Qatar, and they still have over 20 billion cubic meters in reserve.
Teamed Up With Energy Giants
The country is growing its scale so quality, especially after the significant increase in natural gas exporting rates. Being one of the biggest oil and natural gas suppliers in the world, Qatar gets to partner with the world’s largest and most known energy suppliers. Companies like ExxonMobil cooperated with Qatar to distribute them their pipelines and build them tankers. The partnership remains to our current day, and it is profitable for both sides.
Beside their partnerships and successful cooperation, Qatar became an international power base for many foreign countries. They became a major supplier of liquid gas for territories like Japan, India, and South Korea. Among their largest customers, you will find the UK, as they import almost one-third of Qatar’s natural gas production. This is a huge revenue source for the country and its economy.Biside the natural gas construction revenue, Qatar makes tons of money from oil production and other great investments. World-famous football clubs like Paris Saint-Germain FC, car manufacturers like Volkswagen, and their own international media network Al Jazeera, pays the country great sums every year.
High Pay For Locals
Qatari citizens are paid higher than anyone else. The average annual salary is approximately $130 thousand. Qatari employees do not pay tax on their salaries or earnings in general, and they get many more additional benefits. Qatari citizens living in Qatar are about 15% of the country’s total population. The government gets its people free luxury life. Any Qatari can get free education and healthcare. Some of them get free housing or at least subsidized, beside the tax exemptions. High payments are not limited to the local Qatari citizens only. Expats get great salaries also in Qatar.
For example, the average IT manager salary can be up to £12,000 a month with bonuses.
But like any small rich country with a small native population. All the hard work is expected to be done by migrants who are willing to take such low paid jobs. The country is developing so quality and building too many projects at once. All this workload requires lots of workers to do. A huge bulk of Qatari workforce is migrants. Many well-educated migrants work in senior positions. The majority are temporary laborers working in oil fields and natural gas construction facilities. And still, some part is working in construction sites, as the country is building its financial center and stadiums to host the football world cup.