The World Cup in Qatar: what is the Kafala system?

From 2010 onwards, after the announcement that Qatar would host the 2022 football World Cup, there has been a large influx of migrants. Most of these workers are from Uganda, Kenya, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, and India. They have faced extreme heat when working on the seven new stadiums of the 2022 FIFA World Cup, all around the country’s capital, Doha. An eighth building, the Khalifa International Stadium, has been extensively redeveloped (first built in 1976).

Migrant workers have worked during the day throughout the year in Qatar. In the summer, temperatures regularly reach 40 to 45°C with peak temperature sometimes being as high as 50°C. With labourers under the Kafala system feeling powerless and obliged to work long hours in manual work this has led to reports of heat stress, heat exertion, and heat stroke.

The Guardian newspaper estimates that 6,500+ migrant workers have died in Qatar since it won the right to host the World Cup (this figure is a not categorised by occupation or place of work), largely due to the country’s intense summer heat.

In 2017, after sustained criticism of the Kafala system, Qatar committed to a number of initiatives and pieces of legislation to benefit migrant labourers. They were:

• A non-discriminatory new minimum wage

• The domestic workers law, which stipulates how many hours can be worked, and makes daily breaks, a weekly day off, and paid holiday mandatory

• A committee for the settlement of labour disputes, to enhance judicial access for workers

• Ending the NOC requirement for workers who wish to change jobs or leave Qatar

• A fund to support payment of unpaid wages

• A ratification of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) which should oblige Qatar to respect and protect the rights of everybody within its territory, without discrimination

A NOC is now not required to change jobs however many workers still report requests to provide one when they attempt to change employment. The ability to move is therefore still restricted for many people in Qatar. Movement, and the freedom to choose your employer, are vital for workers to avoid abusive circumstances.

While leaving the country has been made easier, in practice migrant workers are still reporting multiple hurdles like passport confiscation and retaliatory measures such as cancelling visas or sponsors filing absconding reports.

Migration 

Multiple changes in the 21st century have increased the complexity of global migration. For example, new environmental hazards from climate change, such as drought and water risk, have led to environmental migration. While the key driving forces behind immigration are still categorised as environmental, social, and economic, the simple “push-pull” migration model (which assumes a simple linear relationship between the environment and movement) is outdated.

There are many reasons why some choose to migrate, some of which overlap and interconnect. The social influences of conflict, declining agricultural production, and low employment run parallel to the psychosocial reasoning of an individual’s intentions, perception of benefits and barriers, cues to action, self-efficacy, and the perceived threat to living conditions. Interwoven with environmental  stress and social influences are economic drivers. It is these economic drivers, of better pay and improved living standards, which are commonly cited as reasons for migration.

It is, therefore, best to consider migration as a complex interplay between different environmental-societal factors which some academics call the “poverty-climate-migration nexus”.

Sri Lankan workers are an example of a migratory workforce. Sri Lankans have suffered from extreme economic hardship in 2022, due to an unstable government and poor leadership. Sri Lanka has defaulted on debt repayments this year and is struggling to attract foreign investment from a combination of COVID-19 (reducing visitor numbers) and economic mismanagement. One consequence has been an inability to buy key imports, such as agricultural fertiliser. In 2021 this led to declining agricultural production and widespread crop failure forcing many farmers to migrate and look for construction work in places like Qatar.  

Economic globalisation has led to the emergence of new source areas of labour and new host destinations. Indian has the largest number of migrants living abroad of any country in the world. Many of whom left due to the perceived benefits of foreign employment in places like Qatar. Whilst the Indian government has lifted millions out of poverty, with the Indian middle class recently growing by 400 million, low standards of living persist in rural areas where 65% of the country still live. Across India 10% of the population still earn less than $2.15 per day (~130,000,000 people).

The Indian Multidimensional Poverty Index rank (MPI) by Niti Aayog (the government public policy think tank) finds the highest levels of poverty in rural Bihar, Jharkhand, and Uttar Pradesh. The main industries of these states are agriculture, mineral extraction, and livestock respectively. All three states are constrained by small landholdings and insufficient invest in technology, leading to outmigration. In contrast, rapid development across the Gulf has created a polarisation in wealth between the Gulf states and the Indian subcontinent which has encouraged Indian (and Nepali, Bangladeshi and Pakistani) workers to migrate in search of a better job, regular income, and the ability to support family back home, via remittances.

Is the FIFA World Cup in Qatar sustainable?

No, it is not. When addressing COP26 the FIFA President Gianni Infantino controversially claimed the Qatar World Cup would be carbon neutral. Overall, the tournament is certainly not carbon neutral because visitors have booked accommodation as far away as Muscat in Oman and Dubai in the UAE (with the intention to fly into the small host country for the tournament). The statement has been reported as disingenuous because the calculation does not consider the 12-year build-up of construction (involving lorries, cranes, diggers, sand, cement and steel). Nor does the commitment acknowledge the only viable way into and out of the country (for the majority of people) being air travel which is dominated by the tournament sponsor, Qatar Airways.

In response to the FIFA President’s claim a Reuters article stressed the high level of resource-consumption to deliver the tournament:

An elite corps of groundskeepers now maintains 144 green, lush fields – eight stadium pitches and 136 training grounds. They blast chilled air through nozzles directly at the turf, tending luxuriant patches of green dotted amid the dun or grey of Qatar’s desert and concrete. Qatar flies in 140 tonnes of grass seed annually from the United States on climate-controlled aircraft and pitches are watered with desalinated seawater, in an energy-intensive process burning the country’s wealth of natural gas. Each pitch requires 10,000 litres of desalinated water daily in winter and 50,000 litres in the summer.  
Andrew Mills

However, once spectators and players are in Qatar, they will find the tournament has been designed around the concept of sustainability with all 8 stadiums lying within 21 miles of the capital, Doha, in a compact design linked by metro and tram services. Some stadiums will be powered by solar panels and all bar one (the Khalifia International Stadium) will be dismantled for the site to be reused and repurposed as hotels, community spaces or smaller sporting venues.