Qatar is a small country in the United Arab Emirates.
Despite having to invite and welcome all members of the United Nations at the Qatar Climate Summit, Qatar is not being so friendly to welcoming Israel at the upcoming climate change event this fall. So goes speculation. Qatar says Israel’s environment minister Gilad Erdan can come with his security detail. But Israel doesn’t believe Qatar. For […]
If we all lived like the citizens of the UAE, we would need 5.4 planet earths to sustain us… Sometimes the best way to say something is not with words but images. And there is truly no better wake up call to the UAE than this amazing infographic designed by Tim De Chant. It shows […]
Find out how Middle Eastern and North African nations fared in the recent global Ocean Health Index (I’ll give you a clue – not very well) With a recent Greenpeace report urging action to tackle the toxicity of Lebanon’s waters due to trash, now seems the perfect time to look into the health of the […]
Olympians Wojdan Shaherkani and Sarah Attar landed world records before the Games even began. But online they battle a new war where social media is calling them the “Prostitutes of the Olympics” You know the story: two teens arrived in London as the first women athletes to ever represent the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), […]
The ‘Adopt A Negotiator’ project is looking for young bloggers and activists from the region to take part in the Doha Climate Change Conference this November Are you a budding blogger with an interest in the environment? Or maybe a video journalist with a passion for social issues? Well, if you are and also happen […]
Hey’Ya: Arab Women in Sport: Sisters Brigitte and Marian Lacombe celebrate Arab female athletes at London’s Sotheby’s Gallery. Last December, Qatar Museums Authority commissioned Brigitte Lacombe, a French photographer known mainly for her work with the film industry, to snap over 70 sportswomen from 20 Arab countries – some with Olympic potential. The project was […]
8th annual Health, Safety and Environment Forum in Energy happens in Doha from October 8 -10 Accidents associated with oil and gas operations endanger human life, damage adjacent communities and threaten the environment. The shockwaves of these accidents affect the business involved and its workers, and extend far beyond. Millions of dollars are spent annually […]
The relationship between Qatar and the UK keeps getting cozier – at least in the realm of architecture. First The Shard, which is owned almost completely by Qatar, was recently unveiled in London, and now the country’s first experimental eco-villa will be designed by a UK-based firm. Curtailed by the recession in their home country, […]
Public transportation is not popular among the Gulf elite who can easily afford the expense of fueling their own cars. And for many, global warming and climate change are nothing more than buzz words. So it will take a special effort to transform the emirate into one that gives up the convenience of personal vehicles. […]
After six years of failing to negotiate with them, a Catalan designer is going public with a story that could cause Qatar tremendous embarrassment in the lead up to the 2022 World Cup. A member of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), the World Trade Organization (WTO) and bound by the Paris Convention and the TRIPS […]
“In Qatar, the birds have built their own hidden city. They live in the towers and stairwells of an abandoned palace…” Over at Guernica Magazine, I stumbled across a beautiful short story by Autumn Watts who is a lecturer of writing at Weill Cornell Medical College in Qatar. Evoking the hidden and unseen aspects of […]
When Britain’s own financing institutions staggered under the weight of the 2008 economic crisis, a Qatari consortium stepped in to finance The Shard in London- it’s a sleek pyramidal skyscraper designed by Italian starchitect Renzo Piano. Officially inaugurated amid great pomp and circumstance, the building is small when compared to Dubai’s 2,717 foot Burj Al-Khalifa, but at […]
Qatar is targeting 76 Acres of LEED Certified Buildings When complete, the Msheireb regeneration project in the heart of Doha’s historical district will feature the world’s largest collection of LEED-certified buildings. Projected to cost $5.5 billion, the city’s new heart will eventually comprise 100 new buildings, all of which will target either Gold or Platinum […]
According to the Worldwatch Institute’s latest report on land grab, the oil-rich Gulf nations are big buyers of foreign land Since 2000, an estimated 70.2 million hectares of agricultural land worldwide has been sold or leased by private or public investors. Most of that land grab took place between 2008 and 2010 and most of […]
Everyone who constructed pavilions for the recently-completed Rio +20 conference in Brazil was required to source their materials locally and to employ members of the Rio de Janiero community to build each structure. But the New York-based industrial design firm Grimshaw Architects distinguished Qatar’s pavilion from the crowd by modeling its shape after the wingspan […]