Qatar Economic Outlook Issue Number 13

Part 1: Economic Outlook 2021 - 2023 
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The presentation of the developments for the 
economic outlook of the Qatari economy will 
depend on the consensus forecasts of a 
number of regional and international 
research centers and banks, which took into 
account the implications of Covid-19 
containment measures on all economic 
indicators. Besides these, the Planning and 
Statistics Authority team itself incorporated 
Covid-related assumptions during its 
analysis of the level of economic 
performance for the period (2017 to 
September 2021), as discussed in Part two. 

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Qatar Economic Outlook 2021 - 2023 
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Box 1-2: The Economic and Social Implications of Covid-19 Containment Measures in Qatar 
Like other countries, Qatar was hit by two waves of Covid-19 during 2020 and 2021. As is well known, the measures taken 
by many countries to contain the spread of the virus led to disruption of the work of ministries and government agencies, 
as well as the closure of many activities of the public and private sectors. This has made people around the world change 
the way they usually do their daily work. Both government institutions and the private sector were forced to resort to remote 
work (online), which directly and indirectly affected people's economic and social lives (for more information about 
government measures check COVID analysis at end of this report). The implications of this can be summarized as follows: 
First: Economic Impacts: 
•
Decreased demand for goods and services, which affected the pace of economic and social activities that led to 
decrease the supply of goods and services. 
•
Disruption of supply chains around the globe, and disruption of local transportation, leading to a slowdown in business. 
•
Closure of many economic activities and businesses, including allocating all medical services in the private and public 
sectors to treating Covid-19 patients, halting the ability of patients to attend routine medical appointments, the 
exception being for emergencies and therefore 
•
Greater use of local and international communication technologies for the purposes of carrying out public and private 
works, and social communication.
•
Staff layoffs and increased percentage of the unemployed and furloughed for better alternative or medical, or family 
issues. 
•
Decreasing revenues for countries due to increasing government expenditures to assist both the public and private 
sectors, which pushed the deficit up.