A Cabinet meeting held in mid-March and chaired by H E Sheikh Khalid bin Khalifa bin Abdulaziz Al Thani, Prime Minister and Minister of Interior, took many decisions on precautionary measures to combat the COVID-19 pandemic including the decision of making 80 percent private sector employees to work from home.
This was along with other decisions including social distancing, complete shutdown of all non-essential businesses exempting food stores, pharmacies and delivery services, stopping home cleaning services and reducing number of workers to half the capacity transported by bus.
Along the decision of suspension of some businesses to curb the virus spread, the government offered QR75bn in incentives to private sector with the aim of easing the economic stress caused by shutdowns of businesses. This includes a program costing QR3bn which will enable the private companies to apply for three months of salary support for their employees where every one of them receives his/her salary directly in their bank accounts.
In order to discuss these issues and and economic conditions resulting from the pandemic, its effects on the private sector, and the solutions to overcome them, H E the Prime Minister and Minister of Interior on Friday met the chairmen and representatives of Qatar Chamber and Qatari Businessmen Association. The video conference meeting was attended by H E Ali bin Ahmed Al Kuwari, Minister of Commerce and Industry, and Chairman of Qatar Free Zones Authority’s Board of Directors, H E Ahmad bin Mohammed Al Sayed.
In the meeting, H E the Prime Minister and Minister of Interior stressed on the directives of Amir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, when His Highness presided over the meeting of the Supreme Committee for Crisis Management on COVID-19 on March 15, on the importance of supporting the private sector and finding ways to increase its contribution in all fields to support economic development.
Some of the ways were providing financial and economic stimulus to the private sector, represented in QR75bn to support commercial banks’ liquidity, the stock market and support staff payroll-salaries and rental fees, under a program administered by Qatar Development Bank. As well under the guarantees program of QDB some sectors like water and electricity are exempted from fees among other related measures. The private sector has also been encouraged to take advantage of the benefits provided by free zones, which include access to the main infrastructure and logistics services, in addition to tax and regulatory benefits among others. These measures require cooperation and support of the private sector to make the whole exercise productive and fruitful.
