During the FIFA Arab Cup, no waste from tournament venues was sent to landfill, and 70% was successfully recycled at Al Bayt Stadium.

The Ministry of Municipality aims to have 60% of all waste created during the World Cup to be separated for recycling, reuse, and other purposes rather than being disposed of in a landfill, authorities confirmed.

This falls in line with Qatar’s pledge to host the first carbon-neutral FIFA World Cup through reducing emissions.

“Shouldering big responsibility towards mega sporting event, we have targeted that 60 percent of total wastes must be sorted out,” said Director of Waste Management and Recycling Department at the Ministry of Municipality, Hamad Al Bahr.

Garbage sorting is crucial to improving the amount of waste recycled as well as the quality of recovered products. Everyone has a responsibility to play in successfully sorting garbage, from individual home input to large business waste loads, according to the director.

In an interview with Qatar TV, he stated that sorting out 60% of waste is much greater than numbers seen during the last World Cup.

“The target is difficult. Therefore we formed a complete team to achieve the target. We made another target to transfer the remaining 40 percent wastes into energy,” said Al Bahr, noting specialised teams have been formed to achieve these goals.

According to Al Bahr, a number of tenders have been issued to engage the private sector. The proposals involve, among other things, delivering garbage containers, cleaning workers, and mobile waste transfer stations to service the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022.

“We have Middle East’s largest waste management centre. We gained pretty good experiences during 2021 FIFA Arab Cup, which provides solid ground to go ahead with our targets,” said Al Bahr.

The municipality has provided two types of waste containers — green and grey — to collect recyclable and non-recyclable wastes separately from consumers, and it urges them to “dispose of their waste accordingly.”