Less than two years remain until the 2026 FIFA World Cup comes to three countries: Canada, the United States and Mexico. In this article, Qatar Customs explains how it prepared for the 2022 edition of the event, which brought together hundreds of the world’s finest football players and more than a million fans.

Qatar had to build many infrastructure projects in the years leading up to the event, including stadiums, an entire road, rail and metro network, as well as hotel complexes and public spaces. This required a tremendous amount of goods and materials to be imported across its borders.

Qatar Customs and other authorities involved in the management of ports of entry were brought together to ensure that Customs facilities were properly equipped to handle such flows of goods and visitors.

New facilities, including reception halls, inspection platforms, and entry and exit gates, were constructed at all major air, sea and land ports in Qatar to expedite the processing of the large number of visitors and shipments expected from other countries.

To ensure that it was able to control the entry of fans into the country swiftly, especially through Hamad International Airport and Doha International Airport, the General Authority of Customs had to estimate the expected volume of foreign visitors during the tournament and assess the number of officers needed. The shift system was modified so that teams would operate around the clock, and extra staff were allocated to them. In addition, employees and officials were provided with advance passenger lists and arrival times so that they could prepare well for their arrival.

Since September 2013, Qatar Customs has used a single window environment known as Al Nadeeb to process all clearance procedures. This system enables coordination between more than 17 government agencies involved in controlling cross-border trade. Al Nadeeb communicates automatically with the relevant authorities, facilitating automated decision-making for approvals, rejections or conditional releases.

The system also enables the economic operators and clearing agents to pay duties and submit declarations online, as well as for traders to authorize clearing agents electronically and to follow up on the status of their declarations 24/7.

In order to facilitate the clearance procedure for entities participating in the World Cup events that were accredited by FIFA and its partners, Qatar Customs established a new online service under Al Nadeeb called the Events Management module.

The new module enabled the Administration to:

• implement a simplified declaration system for World Cup registered entities;
• apply duty and tax exemptions for shipments imported by those entities that match specific goods nomenclature codes;
• process requests for licenses and permits in coordination with the relevant regulatory agencies.

Other modules were added to Al Nadeeb in order to:

• speed up the process for the entry of exceptional commercial shipments through the Abu Samra border post which connects Qatar and Saudi Arabia;
• record the movement of maritime ships transporting tourists;
• exempt food items from Customs duties during the six-month period preceding the World Cup;
• facilitate temporary imports including sports equipment and logistical supplies, technical devices for sports teams, organizers and specialized work teams for all state-run projects.

Finally, the Administration established a list of early crisis signs as well as processes to detect and report them, and prepared emergency response and disaster recovery plans.

Several months before the start of the World Cup, a Support Team consisting of more than 100 highly skilled employees from all departments was created to provide comprehensive support during emergency situations or exceptional events. The team was available 24/7 to address the needs of employees and give them instructions.

In addition, all Customs officers underwent retraining in their respective areas of work. More than 120 training courses were developed to enhance officers’ knowledge and skills across various topics, including:

• the new Customs procedures and exemptions in place during the World Cup;
• risk management processes;
• techniques to detect illicit trade;
• methods to deal with hazardous materials;
• best practices for communicating with the public.

All inspection equipment were duly checked ahead of the event. New devices were implemented and tested to ensure their proper functioning during peak times.

Some applications (described below) were developed to tighten the control and supervision of the flow of goods, means of conveyance and individuals.

A vehicle tracking system was developed in cooperation with the Ministry of the Interior in order to transfer supervision of the vehicle exit process from the General Authority of Customs to the Ministry of the Interior. The system was integrated into the Ministry’s IT system in order to enable the exchange of information at entry and exit points between Customs officers and officers of the Passport and Border Control Department.

The Al Nadeeb system was also connected to the IT system of the Unified Insurance Office in order to exchange information on registered vehicles. This reduced the effort and time required by insurance employees to enter vehicle information into their IT system and helped alleviate the congestion of non-Qatari vehicles at the vehicle registration desk for insurance purposes.

Customs collaborated with the Ministry of Health to establish the Wathiq system, one of the key national projects for managing food control processes throughout Qatar. This comprehensive system includes three interconnected electronic systems which digitalize processes related to imported food, local food and laboratory analysis to ensure the highest possible level of food safety, following international best practices in this field.

Industrial enterprises can be granted Customs exemptions for the import of equipment and machinery, parts, raw materials, semi-manufactured materials and primary packing materials throughout their business operations. Quantities to be exempted are, however, specified in accordance with the industrial exemption decision. Should those quantities be exceeded, applicable Customs taxes/duties are collected on the extra quantities.

A project was launched to automatically process industrial exemption requests and the quantities of goods to be exempted and verify the validity of industrial exemption decisions.

Cyber security was made a priority, and many investments were made in this area involving the implementation of anti-phishing tools and security measures such as malware and virus protection, as well as data encryption and hacking prevention. Training sessions were held to raise awareness among the Authority’s employees.

To strengthen and test the security of its IT systems, the Administration worked in collaboration with the National Cyber Security Agency (NCSA), undertaking various exercises to demonstrate its capacity to respond to cyber incidents. It received high praise from the Agency which wrote in its 2023 report that “The team delivered an excellent performance in crisis response.”

More information
info.pr@customs.gov.qa