Analyzing Qatar Water Policies Through Qualitative Analysis, Quantitative Social Network Analysis and Regional Benchmarking

Adaptive governance and management practices are crucial in the water resources sector to ensure long-and short-term sustainability. Within this realm, there are a lot of political and institutional rules, practices, and decisions that must be considered while also accounting for the heterogeneity of stakeholders. In addition, the great variety of interests in the arena can often hinder the ultimate sustainability objective. Qatar made a lot of efforts in working towards the sustainable use of water and conservation of natural resources, which is reflected in the national reports, the water sector’s KPIs, and targets. Despite those achievements, the country still faces many challenges in having an integrated water management structure and planning. Therefore, the main aim of this work is to discover Qatar’s governance structure by analyzing Qatar's water policies and identifying water sector stakeholders and their roles. This work is divided into five main objectives, which start by analyzing Qatar's previous and current water policies, identification of policy gaps, identification of Qatar stakeholders, benchmarking with Gulf Cooperation Council countries, and finally, using Social Network Analysis to discover the roles of stakeholders with respect to the policy domains identified from the water policy analysis.

This work methodology has been divided into Qualitative work, which was utilized to analyze policy articles and national documents such as Qatar's National Development strategy, Qatar National Vision, Qatar National research strategy, and Qatar National voluntary review. In addition to the analysis of policy text to find out the policy domains, a thematic analysis was conducted to find out the main themes that the water policy in Qatar discusses. Policy gaps were also identified by comparing the available policies with the water challenges identified from national documents. Finally, Social Network Analysis was conducted by developing a matrix of stakeholders and policy domains to construct a sociogram and visualize the water governance structure of Qatar. The results of this study show that little focus has yet been provided to groundwater sustainability and aquifer management. In addition, desalinated water requires specific policies targeting efficient consumption of water.

Finally, Treated Sewage Effluent requires more policies on its uses and how its utilization can contribute to diversifying the water sources portfolio and routing toward water conservation. The benchmarking exercise with Gulf Cooperation Council countries showed that Gulf countries' water policies cover various themes of water sector organization. Social Network Analysis helped in illustrating the governance structure through a sociogram of Qatar water stakeholders and the policy domains. Additionally, the involvement of various stakeholders, such as academic institutions, can provide tremendous support and insights into water governance in Qatar and the region, reflected in providing governmental organizations with consultations and supporting solutions for the current environmental challenges.