Georgetown launches Executive Majlis series

Rob Sherwin

11:35 PM

4

March

2015

Addressing the topic of “How an international investor can contribute to Qatar National Vision 2030”, Georgetown University in Qatar (GU-Q) launched its Executive Majlis series recently.
It gathered senior executives from across industry sectors to engage in dialogue on this issue of critical importance to their principal interests and the future of Qatar.
Delivering the inaugural keynote, Rob Sherwin, general manager (corporate affairs) and deputy country chairman at Qatar Shell, presented on the role Qatar Shell has played as the largest international investor in Qatar and its commitment to supporting Qatar National Vision 2030 in each of its four pillars.
“Georgetown University in Qatar’s Executive Majlis is a valuable forum in which current and future leaders can share perspectives on topics relevant to Qatar’s development, and Qatar Shell is always keen to support such university outreach initiatives. Qatar Shell’s approach to corporate social responsibility is all about building sustainable partnerships that have a measurable impact towards the goals of Qatar National Vision 2030, particularly in the field of human development,” said Sherwin.
He then went on to facilitate an interactive discussion on how other organisations also demonstrate their commitment to Qatar National Vision 2030 in effective and meaningful ways.
Senior executives from Boeing, British Council, Commercial Bank, Green Gulf, Doha Bank, Mashreq Bank, Qatar Central Bank, Squire Patton Boggs and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights as well as members of the GU-Q faculty and staff also took part in the forum.
“GU-Q’s Executive Majlis was created to bring together senior leaders from across the broad spectrum of Qatari society to engage in an open discussion on some of the important current issues being faced by the country. We see our primary role as the facilitator of this discussion and will work closely with our invited senior leaders to ensure that experts on the important topics the group wants to discuss are identified and invited to stimulate the discussion in a relaxed and convivial environment. In doing all of this, we hope to build stronger cross-sector relationships between those attending and serve as a connector between the academic, business and governmental sectors,” noted Jonathan Cartmell, GU-Q executive director of outreach and business development.
GU-Q’s Executive Majlis series will continue in April and feature Vodafone CEO Kyle Whitehall, who will engage the group in a discussion on localising international brands and engaging with audiences in Qatar. Future topics under consideration include Human Capital Reform, Commercial Sector Reform and Regional Security

First edition of Qumra receives huge support

A still from The Narrow Frame of Midnight to be screened at Qumra.

11:43 PM

4

March

2015

The inaugural edition of Qumra, a new event by Doha Film Institute (DFI) dedicated to the development of emerging filmmakers from Qatar and around the world, has received extensive support from the Qatari business, educational and cultural community and key international
film media outlets.
Several leading business entities, cultural organisations and educational entities have stepped forward to partner with Qumra, which will be held from tomorrow until March 11.
Fatma al-Remaihi, CEO, DFI, said: “The partnership that the business, cultural community and other stakeholders in Qatar has extended to Qumra plays an integral role in hosting a quality event for our participants - both the emerging talents and industry veterans who will share their insights on filmmaking and help pave the way for a strong culture of filmmaking in the country.
“We are delighted that several of our partners have consistently associated with our events and see true value in supporting DFI’s initiatives that engage the filmmaking community and the public. Their patronage enables us to make a difference and we are thankful to them for their
ongoing support.”
Reinforcing its commitment to promoting the Qatari cultural scene, Katara – the Cultural Village is the cultural partner of Qumra, serving as a vibrant venue of the event.
Supported by Al Jazeera Perfumes, Qumra has on board Sony and Fifty One East as official electronics partners while MAC Cosmetics is the official makeup sponsor. St Regis Doha is the official hotel partner.
Other supporters of Qumra include Northwestern University in Qatar, Sarajevo Film Festival and the Translation and Interpreting Institute.
The event is promoted by official media partners Al Jazeera Media Network, Festival Scope, I Love Qatar and Screen
International.
Qumra will showcase a programme of public screenings featuring films by the Qumra Masters who represent some of the leading names in world cinema – Gael García Bernal, Leila Hatami, Cristian Mungiu, Abderrahmane Sissako and Danis Tanovic - alongside new voices in cinema selected from films supported by DFI’s grants and co-financing programmes.
More than 100 delegates from all facets of the film industry will participate in the industry programme, including representatives from leading international film festivals, funding bodies, sales, production and distribution companies along with development specialists and script consultants.
The industry professionals will be connected to filmmakers linked to 29 projects at various stages of production in a series of bespoke mentorship labs and meetings designed to propel their projects to the next stage.

Barwa Bank sponsors Cancer Day event

11:44 PM

4

March

2015

A Barwa Bank official receiving a memento from QCS chairman Sheikh Dr Khalid bin Jabor al-Thani.

Barwa Bank was a diamond sponsor for the World Cancer Day 2015 event organised by the Qatar Cancer Society, in line with the bank’s role in social responsibility and raising awareness amongst the Qatari community.
Khalid Mahdi al-Ahbabi, executive general manager and chief business officer, represented Barwa Bank at the event held last month at Katara to raise awareness about signs and symptoms of cancer which, if detected early, is much more treatable.
Khalid al-Subeai, acting CEO, said Barwa Bank was very proud to take part in this global event highlighting the importance of early detection of cancer.
“Our support to the Qatar Cancer Society’s initiative reflects our commitment to the Qatar National Vision 2030 and the state’s aspirations for a healthy society.
“Barwa Bank has been active in a number of health initiatives as such support is in line with our core principles and our commitment to the well-being of all members of society. We will continue to support such initiatives and work with various institutions in Qatar to contribute positively,” he added.

South Korean president’s visit to strengthen ties with Qatar

President Park Geun-hye: due in Doha tomorrow.

11:54 PM

4

March

2015

South Korean President Park Geun-hye arrives in Doha tomorrow on a three-day official visit to Qatar as part of her current tour of four GCC countries.
President Park, who began her nine-day regional trip on March 1, has already visited Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. She arrived in the United Arab Emirates yesterday. Qatar is the last leg of her current Middle East tour.
Diplomatic sources said yesterday that President Park would have wide-ranging talks in Doha, with the focus on strengthening economic and cultural relations.
“The president will meet with HH the Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani and several ministers,” the source said.
Memorandums of understanding (MoUs) are expected to be signed by the two countries in education, public health, tourism and telecommunications technology, paving the way for closer co-ordination and co-operation between institutions in the two countries.
In the energy sector, a memorandum on nuclear co-operation is also expected to be signed.
“President Park (during her visit) will give an evaluation of bilateral relations that marked the 40th anniversary last year and will also express her commitment to developing bilateral relations (further) looking to the future,” the source said.
“Her visit is expected to secure more business opportunities for Korean firms in Qatar, the host of the 2022 FIFA World Cup.”
HH the Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani paid a successful visit to South Korea in November last year, cementing bilateral relations.
“The (current) presidential trip (to the Middle East) carries added significance, in that it will expand the diplomatic horizon of the (South Korean) administration,” the source said.
“In a year marking the 50th anniversary of the advance into overseas construction business and the entrance into the Middle East some 40 years ago, the visit is expected to serve as an opportunity to capitalise on the ‘second Middle East boom’ that started in the late 2000s, as a new growth engine to facilitate the implementation of the Three-year Plan for Economic Innovation,” the source said.
“This will also make contributions to bolstering substantive, co-operative ties with the four nations as well as to securing critical co-operation for the resolution of the North Korean nuclear problem and the realisation of peaceful unification. On top of this, it will also help enhance the security of Koreans travelling in the region and promote the benefits of those who are residing in those countries.”
The UAE, the third destination of the presidential trip, has a strategic partnership with Korea and is the first country to which Korea exported a nuclear power plant.
On Tuesday, South Korea and Saudi Arabia signed a memorandum on nuclear co-operation during the visit by President Park to Riyadh.
South Korea and Saudi Arabia reached a “memorandum of understanding in the field of nuclear co-operation programmes,” a partnership in research and skills development, the state Saudi Press Agency (SPA) said.
South Korea’s Minister of Science, ICT and Future Planning, Choi Yang-hee, signed the memorandum with Saudi official Hisham bin Abdullah Yamani.
A “framework agreement” on technical co-operation, research and development and the exchange of personnel in the nuclear field has also been signed.
South Korea and Saudi Arabian ministers signed two other economic pacts, including one on sea transport, the Saudi Press Agency reported.
In Kuwait which was President Park’s first stop of the Middle East tour, the two countries signed three agreements and memorandums of understanding.
They included an agreement on mutual visa exemption for holders of diplomatic and special passports, a memo of understanding in the field of health and another memo of understanding on bilateral land transportation co-operation.
The Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (KPC) and South Korea’s, Korea National Oil Corporation (KNOC), SK Gas Company and Kia Shore Company inked three memos of understanding.
President Park and Emir Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmed al-Jaber al-Sabah held a summit at the Bayan Palace.
President Park’s visit to Kuwait was the first by a Korean president since March 2007.
“South Korea hopes that its companies can participate in big industrial and infrastructure projects being pushed by Middle East countries, as they seek to diversify their economic portfolios ahead of the inevitable advent of a post-oil era amid a recent plunge in crude prices,” South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reported ahead of President Park’s tour.
President Park has described Middle East countries as perfect partners for South Korea as they are pushing for development in various fields, including energy and healthcare.

Emir attends closing of Annual Purebred Arabian Camel Races

12:20 AM

5

March

2015

HH the Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani attended yesterday afternoon the closing ceremony of the Annual Purebred Arabian Camel Races for HH the Emir’s sword, at Al Shahaniya race track. The Emir honoured the winners as well as the sponsors of the festival. Dubai Crown Prince Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohamed bin Rashid al-Maktoum also honoured the winners. Prince Turki bin Mohamed bin Fahd bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, the chairman of the Saudi Committee for Camel Races, was present.

Ooredoo to partner with iMobileMagic for app

Al-Sayed and Leal after announcing the new partnership.

12:21 AM

5

March

2015

Ooredoo has announced a new partnership with Portuguese mobile application development company iMobileMagic at the ongoing Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain.
The ‘Ooredoo Family Safety’ service based on iMobileMagic’s PhoneNear cloud platform will enable people in Qatar to track, alert and communicate with their loved ones in real-time over smartphones, tablets or computers.
This new personal safety service will be the first-of-its-kind in Qatar, enabling Ooredoo customers to locate and know where their family members are at all times.
iMobileMagic, which creates innovative products dedicated to family and child safety, has customised PhoneNear specifically to cater for the needs of parents and families in the country, based on research provided by Ooredoo.
Ooredoo’s service has been designed to provide peace of mind for customers with small children, vulnerable people in their care, or elderly relatives. The service provides a location feed direct to mobile devices, and is also equipped with a panic button feature, so that the child or dependent can alert their whole family immediately if there is a problem.
“Ooredoo is striving to introduce a range of ‘Smart Services’ for Qatar, and this family-focused service fulfils an important need for the whole community,” said Waleed al-Sayed, chief operating officer, Ooredoo Qatar.
“We believe in using mobile technology to enhance people’s digital lifestyles, and we know that safety and security are key issues for every parent,” he explained.
Sheikh Nasser bin Hamad bin Nasser al-Thani, chief new business officer, recalled that Ooredoo has been working with iMobileMagic for almost a year, since first sitting with them at Mobile World Congress 2014.
“We recognised that this was a solution that would appeal to families across Qatar, and have strived to ensure that this new service fully meets the needs of Ooredoo customers,” he observed.
Pointing out that the theme of this year’s GSMA Mobile World Congress is ‘The Edge of Innovation’, Marco Leal, CEO, iMobileMagic, said the Ooredoo Family Safety service will demonstrate how mobile technology can improve families’ lives.
“Our mission is to deliver high quality mobile experiences through consumer focus, and this new service from Ooredoo will offer new levels of security and peace-of-mind in Qatar.”
Ooredoo Family Safety will be the only service in Qatar that offers all its features in one easy-to-use product. Customers will be able to visit a dedicated website and connect their family phones to a shared platform.
Features include real-time location and pre-set safety areas, so that people with young children can define safe spaces such as their home, school, and grandparent’s house. If a child moves outside of the safe spaces, the service triggers an alert to the parents’ phones. The service will also enable family members to send help requests through the panic button, which will deliver the message to all family members connected to Ooredoo Family Safety.
Additional safety features include the facility to protect smartphones connected to the service in case they are lost or stolen. The feature will allow customers to remotely ring their devices, lock them with a custom message, and delete all information on the phone.
To activate and manage their accounts, Ooredoo will provide a dedicated website and smartphone application for iPhone, Android and Windows phones. The application, together with the service’s website, will offer a complete family location and protection solution. To ensure personal security and privacy is available at all times, the phones can only be part of the service with the permission of each individual owner.
 lOoredoo and Telefonica, a leading Spanish telecommunications provider in terms of market capitalisation and number of customers, have announced the signing of a strategic partnership agreement that will allow Ooredoo to optimise its affiliates purchasing costs in selected types of network and customer equipment.
Under the terms of the agreement, Ooredoo will become part of Telefonica’s partners programme, which enables telecommunications operators to work together and to benefit from Telefonica’s scale and knowledge, Ooredoo said in a press release issued yesterday.
The two companies agreed to work together to capture synergies in procurement, the main area of co-operation. Both groups will focus on leveraging the economies of scale and the broad experience in centralised procurement of Telefonica. They will work towards coordinating selected purchases “end to end”, including technical alignment of specifications, selection of vendors and synchronised negotiations.
Ooredoo and Telefonica will also engage in other business areas under the scope of the partners programme such as alignment in key technology projects, common approach to multinational clients for M2M, managed mobility and data services, staff development and training programmes, and international wholesale.
The partnership is expected to reinforce the positions of both groups in the areas agreed and further accelerate Ooredoo consolidation as an international group by sharing Telefonica’s proven experience on cross-country co-ordination and synergies generation.

Huge rise in job orders for Filipino workers

Philippine labour attaché Leopoldo De Jesus.

9:59 PM

3

March

2015

By Joey Aguilar/Staff Reporter
The Philippine Overseas Labour Office (POLO) has recorded a significant increase in the number of job orders (JOs) from different recruitment agencies in Qatar during the past few weeks.
"We now process more individual employment contracts for Filipino workers daily," labour attaché Leopoldo De Jesus told Gulf Times.
This surge could be attributed to the 94,289 visas reserved for Filipino workers whom Qatar government is expecting to be deploy soon, he explained.
The number of the visas reserved is about half of the total Filipino expatriate population (188,000) in Qatar. The “positive development” may also be a result of the Joint Committee Meeting (JCM) on labour matters between Qatar and the Philippines held early this month, according to the senior Philippine labour official.
“We hope to meet the numbers needed and send more Filipino workers to Qatar in the coming months,” he said.
De Jesus noted a huge demand for skilled and semi-skilled Filipino construction workers, as well as professionals such as engineers, architects and safety officers.
The Philippines is also set to deploy nurses and other medical practitioners such as doctors, radiologists, and dentists, among others with various private clinics expected to open across the country soon. It is learnt that salary offers has remained attractive in these fields for such workers.
Details of available JOs (as of Feb 26) indicating the position, name of recruitment accredited agency, country of deployment and the number of needed workers are posted on the website of the Philippine Overseas Employment Administrator (http://www.poea.gov.ph).
These include Filipino sales persons, drivers, lifeguards, beauticians/hairdressers, sales ladies, baby sitters, baristas, florists, laboratory technicians, dental assistants, cooks, receptionists, service crews (fast foods) and a variety of categories.
Several job openings in Information Technology, services and production sectors for Filipino workers were also mentioned during the JCM.
The deployment of Filipino workers undergoes a streamlined processing system (certified as ISO-compliant quality management system) in a bid to protect their welfare.
De Jesus noted that the demand for Filipino household service workers has also significantly increased since last year and continued to surge this year.
In a recent Gulf Times report, first secretary and consul Gonaranao B Musor disclosed that the figures (94,289 visas) came from Labour and Social Affairs Deputy Minister Hussein bin Youssef al-Mulla at the JCM. The Philippines received 78,426 JOs from Qatar last year.
The JCM was created through the bilateral labour agreement between Qatar and the Philippines signed on May 10, 1997.
The Committee, comprised of three representatives from the two governments, is expected to meet every two years. The third meeting will be held in Manila later this year.
“The JCM is a forum that ventilates and threshes out outstanding issues on both sides and therefore greatly helps in establishing closer bilateral relation and cooperation,” ambassador Crescente Relacion said. Musor had described the bilateral relationship between the two countries as “very cordial.”