Qatar Daily News

Although the flow of foreign direct investment (FDI) into Arab countries declined in 2009 as a fallout of the global financial crisis, Qatar witnessed a rise in FDI inflow last year.

The FDI inflow into Qatar was to the tune of $8.7bn, up from $6.7bn in the previous year, media reports suggest.

Qatar, which is the largest exporter of liquefied natural gas (LNG) in the world, was second only to Saudi Arabia, which is the largest Arab economy, in terms of FDI inflow in 2009. The inflow into the Saudi economy was to the extent of a staggering $35.5bn.

However, the difference between Qatar and Saudi Arabia, whose fast-expanding petrochemical sector remains the main FDI puller, was that the FDI inflow (into Saudi Arabia) declined from $38.2bn in 2008 to $35.5bn the following year. In the case of Qatar, the inflow rose in 2009 as compared to 2008.
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Qatar will remain one of the fastest growing economies in the world in 2010, as continued heavy investment in the hydrocarbon sector drives higher oil and gas output levels, a new report has predicted.

Research firm Business Monitor International said it sees see real gross domestic product growth averaging 7.5 percent from 2009-2013, with the most rapid expansion occurring in 2010 and 2011, when growth of 13.3 percent and 9.1 percent is predicted.
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Soaring gas exports will ally with rebounding oil prices and production to catapult Qatar’s economy into double-digit growth in the next two years while its fiscal surplus will sharply widen, a key Saudi bank said yesterday.

The gross domestic product of the world’s third gas power is estimated to have swelled by 9.4 per cent this year despite the adverse impact of the global financial turmoil after leaping by nearly 14.3 per cent in 2008.

“The outlook for the next couple of years is bright. Three new 7.8 million tonnes a year LNG trains are expected to come on stream, while those which started operations during late 2009 should be producing at close to full capacity. Overall LNG output is expected to rise from about 40 million tonnes in 2009 to more than 75 million tonnes by 2012, with much of the increase occurring in 2010,” the Saudi American Bank Group (Samba) said in a study.
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Qatar’s economy continued its rapid climb and jumped by nearly 59 per cent in the first nine months of 2008 despite a sharp decline in oil prices in the last weeks of that period, official figures showed yesterday.

The Gulf country’s gross domestic product stood at QR107.79 billion (Dh109bn) in the first nine months of 2008 compared with nearly QR66.56bn (Dh67.5bn) in the same period of 2007, showed the figures by Qatar’s Statistics Authority of the Government Planning Council.

The GDP even recorded better quarterly performance, leaping by around 63 per cent in the third quarter of 2008 over the same period of 2007.

Oil and gas contributed by 73 per cent of the GDP growth in the first nine months of 2008 while gas alone accounted for nearly half, the report showed.
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