The World Cup is coming to Qatar! Everyone celebrate!
Wait, where the heck is Qatar? If you haven’t heard of the small Arabian Peninsula nation,
you’re not alone - and you could easily miss it
on a map. It’s the 158th country in the world by size, out of 195,
and it’s only 4,473 square miles - smaller than major cities including Beijing and Istanbul.
It has a population of just under 2.8 million people, putting it in 76th place in terms of
population density and 139th overall. It’s a very small place in just about every way.
Every way except one.
Qatar is rich. Very rich. Its economy is largely dominated by oil and energy production. In terms
of nominal GDP, it’s in 55th place - and per capita, it’s in fifth only behind Luxembourg,
Ireland, Norway, and Switzerland. And that’s given it the ability to punch well above
its weight class on the global scale. While it’s technically a constitutional monarchy,
it’s a one-party state and its Emir has final say on just about all national affairs. And that man,
Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al Thani, wants to be recognized as a power player in the Middle
East. Part of that is getting the World Cup and establishing the country as a soccer powerhouse.
But there are a few problems with that.
For one thing, Qatar doesn’t really have much of a soccer history, only starting in 1948 - when oil
workers there organized an impromptu match. The Qatari Sports League plays regularly,
with matches seeing attendance of up to ten thousand - a fraction of those seen in matches
in Brazil or France. However, the vast majority of residents have never attended a soccer match
and the stadiums there are fairly small by comparison to the rest of the world.
And this isn’t a coincidence.
Some of the reasons soccer is less popular in Qatar are cultural - Qatar is a strict Muslim
country, with many of their laws reflecting that. While women are allowed at soccer
stadiums in Qatar, many are uncomfortable with the close quarters. And of course,
no alcohol is allowed - a deal-breaker at many stadiums around the world! Additionally,
the country’s strict prohibitions against homosexuality mean many LGBT fans from
around the world might be hesitant to travel to the country - even for the World Cup.
But that’s not the biggest challenge facing Qatar.
Put simply, Qatar was not meant to host the World Cup - but a savvy campaign from an Emir who wanted
to be in the game means they’re holding it nonetheless. Now everyone involved has to
figure out how to make it possible - starting with the fact that the climate is the furthest thing
from hospitable for even a high-intensity board game. Remember gym class in early June in school,
when the teacher was making you run laps as the sun was beating down? Take that and magnify it,
because Qatar is one of the hottest places in the world. The World Cup regularly occurs
during the northern hemisphere’s summer - and as Qatar is near the equator,
temperatures there regularly reach over 120 degrees Fahrenheit. That’s not only
brutally hot - that’s life-threatening, especially during physical activity.
So FIFA decided something had to be done.
For the first time ever, the World Cup was moved out of the summer to play in November
2022 instead. Surely this means a nice cool World Cup with a brisk breeze in the air,
right? Not quite - because cooler than average in Qatar still means pretty hot. As of mid-November,
temperatures are hovering in the mid-80s in desert conditions,
which means that athletes will still find themselves overheating and they may be more
prone to mistakes during the game. But under the current conditions, they should be able to keep
hydrated and play a normal match - and all it took was moving the game to a different season!
And of course, it’s not just the players.
World Cup stadiums are massive, and large crowds radiate heat. That means that those watching the
game could be at risk for overheating as well, and there will be no cool beers to cool off! Instead,
Qatar boasted of using the power of solar panels to convert solar energy
into electricity that would power fans and deliver the excess energy back to the power
grid. Not only would this keep people cool, but it would make the event carbon-neutral.
Will this work? No one’s sure, but the winter World Cup in Qatar should alleviate most of
these problems - even if it interrupts the European League’s regular season.
Of course, there’s another major problem - where are we putting all these people?
The World Cup is one of the most attended events in the world, with previous World
Cups seeing total attendance records of over three million people and more than
50,000 people in a game. That’s a total attendance record of more than Qatar’s
overall population - and while countries like Brazil, Russia, and South Africa could easily
accommodate a massive number of tourists, Qatar simply doesn’t have that capability. Unlike other
small countries on the Arabian peninsula like the United Arab Emirates, it usually doesn’t attract a
big tourist population - most of its visitors are business travelers. But that’s about to change.
So Qatar had to build a whole new infrastructure.
How new? Qatar announced that in the years up to the World cup, they would be developing a
major new public transportation network with the Doha Metro line as its centerpiece, supplemented
by a light rail line. Additionally, they would more than triple their total amount of highways
to accommodate the massive influx of tourists, and introduce a major new bus network. This in itself
would cost billions of dollars and result in Qatar being far more well-set up for future tourists.
Qatar’s geography does provide it an advantage in one key way.
Because Qatar is small, this will provide fans with easy access to all the stadiums. The World
Cup will be spread out over five major cities - the capital of Doha, along with Al Khor, Lusail,
Al Rayyan, and Al Wakrah. The driving distance from the most northern city to the most southern
city will be less than an hour in good traffic - but don’t count on good traffic! All these cities,
which hold the vast majority of the country’s population, are all clustered on the eastern
coast of Qatar - and they’re going to be extremely overcrowded during the World Cup.
In fact, saying that they’re the majority of the population may be underselling it.
Qatar’s population is just under 2.8 million people - and Doha’s population alone is over
two million! The country is designed for its current population, with most of the other cities
being essentially starter projects that are designed to accommodate some of the
population once they’re fully set up. The World Cup has kick-started some of that development,
with all five cities getting major new hotel projects so that there’s room for all
the tourists - but that means the cities may be heavily unfinished, giving tourists the impression
that they’re living in a model town rather than an actual city if they’re not in Doha. After all,
building a city from scratch requires much more than a decade-long project.
And all of this comes with a cost.
The World Cup is a massive affair, and every country that gets it has to devote a massive
investment to it. Billions of dollars, in fact. FIFA offers a heavy financial
commitment to the host countries, including the prize money to the tournament winners,
but it only covers a fraction of the cost in most cases. How big a fraction? That depends
on the country’s infrastructure. Countries like Brazil and South Africa usually either build new
stadiums capable of holding the massive crowds or upgrade existing ones, and build facilities for
all the visiting athletes. That cost usually runs between two and five billion dollars.
Qatar spent a lot more. How much more?
Try close to a hundred times more. The estimated cost of the World Cup 2022 in
Qatar is over two hundred billion dollars - most of it put up by Qatar as an investment in the
country’s future. Because while most countries just have to bolster their infrastructure,
Qatar largely build it from the ground up. And that came with a massive cost that the Emir is
more than willing to pay. But others are concerned about the hidden cost. This kind of massive
project doesn’t come without a human toll - and Qatar largely staffed it with migrant workers,
several thousand of which have died due to poor working conditions in the hot desert sun!
And another of Qatar’s promises seems to be falling apart as well.
One of Qatar’s biggest points of pride about the 2022 World Cup was that they
would be the first Carbon-neutral World Cup in a world increasingly concerned
about climate change - but the reality might be very different. The group Carbon Market
Watch has observed the construction and says that the actual emissions might be
massively underreported - by as much as a factor of eight! The fuzzy math Qatar is
using calculates the impact of the stadium over its entire life, but in the case of a
World Cup stadium they’re unlikely to be used extensively after the event - especially since
Qatar got by with only one mid-sized stadium in Doha, and will now have a total of eight!
So the question is - how did the World Cup wind up happening in Qatar anyway?
Depending on who you ask, it’s either savvy marketing - or blatant corruption. What we
know is that Qatar spent more on its bid for the Cup than any other country in history,
and was willing to commit an unprecedented amount of money to the process. But according
to some sources - primarily from Australia, which lost the vote for the Cup - Qatar
offered FIFA several hundred million dollars to approve their bid. This was back in 2010,
but it became part of a much larger investigation in 2015 when a massive FIFA scandal broke and
several top officials were arrested or removed from office. While nothing has ever been proven
and the Qatar World Cup went ahead, many people insist that corrupt was involved.
But as the World Cup in Qatar kicks off, what is it likely to look like?
Qatar has done its best to overcome its geography - especially for a country that’s primarily
contained within one giant metro area in the desert. But it’s too early to say how effective
this will be. There are two main scenarios that could play out, and neither of them is ideal. The
first has Qatar seeing a much lower attendance number than previous World Cups, due to people
not feeling comfortable with attending. This could be due to doubts over the infrastructure,
concerns over the country’s human rights record, or fans from certain backgrounds
not feeling comfortable staying there. In this case, Qatar could find itself with
massive shortfalls in revenue and be left with expensive infrastructure it has little use for.
But it could also find itself losing by winning.
Let’s say it’s a smashing success! Nothing can keep soccer fans at bay, and they flood the
small Emirate for the biggest sports event of the year. Soon, Doha is overcrowded, with its hotels,
stadiums, and public transportation system quickly overwhelmed. Qatar puts on the World Cup,
but its unique geography means it might not be able to accommodate a crowd of this size - no
matter how many expansions it builds in the Doha metro area. Are Doha’s newer sister
cities ready for the influx of tourists? Is the bustling Doha metropolis ready to see
its population expand massively for a few weeks? There’s only one way to find out.
Will Qatar’s massive gambit pay off, or are the challenges of its geography just too
much to overcome? This is the biggest question on everyone’s mind - except,
of course, who will win the World Cup!
Want to be a good guest at the World Cup? Check out “Embarrassing
Tourist Mistakes You Make in Different Countries” or watch this video instead.