Danube Building Materials, a leader in construction, building materials and shop fitting industries, is opening a Dh50 million ($13.6 million) retail facility in Qatar in the middle of this year.

The company has also revealed its plans to secure key opportunities in Qatar World Cup projects signaling the start of its strategic move to consolidate presence in the country in the next five months.

Qatar is currently investing billions of dollars in the development of key tourism based infrastructure like new hotels, dining facilities and football stadiums for the month-long international tournament in 2022. Following this development, UAE contractors have also expressed their interest in playing a major role the growing number of Qatar projects - Danube has maintained strong relations with these key contractors and is expected to play a major role once contracts are secured and executed.

The move to open a new retail facility in Qatar is part of the company’s plans of investing more than Dh200 million in an expansion initiative over the next two years. Once opened, the new Qatar branch will be the company’s fifth destination in the region.

Danube, which has been in the construction and building materials industry for 17 years, has a total of over 25 global retail facilities - 17 in the UAE, three in India, two in Oman and Bahrain and one in Saudi Arabia.

Financial experts have pegged Qatar’s construction activity will run up to $86.5 billion worth of projects - which includes nine spectacular stadiums, the extensive renovation of three existing stadiums worth $3 billion. Infrastructure works over the next five years will also cover $25 billion worth of rail projects within Qatar to link internal host cities, as well as improving connections to Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. Another $20 billion will be spent on roads, $11 billion on a new airport and $5.5 billion on a new port.

“These are exciting times for Qatar’s construction industry. The country’s hosting of one of the world’s most watched sporting event means billions of dollars in new and existing construction projects,” said Rizwan Sajan, chairman, Danube Building Materials.

“We are very upbeat about this forecasted growth and increase in projects, prompting us to create a stronger presence in the country by opening a new retail facility in mid-2011 and eyeing our participation in different project undertakings. Aside from Qatar, we are also moving to expand our presence in Saudi Arabia - over the next few months both Saudi Arabia and Qatar are expected to witness rapid pace development as a result of the coming World Cup.”-TradeArabia News Service