KON Group, a Qatari firm working with several embassies here to boost trade relations between Qatar and its international partners, has appointed 'business ambassadors' as part of a Community Awareness Programme with seven African countries.
The Community Awareness Programme, under the name of ‘Ta3araf’, aims to increase awareness about Qatar in every community, said Muna al-Yakoub, head of Training & Orientation at KON.
For the first phase of the programme, KON had involved community leaders, who will act as business ambassadors, from the following countries: South Africa, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Nigeria, Sudan, and Tunisia.
“Our initial meeting with community leaders is subject to a survey to determine the communities’ perception and their current level of awareness, and we have identified that each community has a different level of awareness,” al-Yakoub said.
According to al-Yakoub, establishing a tailored awareness programme for each community that works to address issues and creating a well-aware and organised community “is both challenging and rewarding.”
This requires an “in-depth understanding” of each community and a “constant drive to engage” both the community and the public, she pointed out, adding that the programme will focus efforts to educate participating communities on Qatar’s laws and its rules and regulations, as well as the benchmarks and milestones.
“This programme is intended to provide an introduction to communication strategies, Qatar laws, ‘to do and not to do’, cultural and religious awareness, business guidelines, Covid-19 restrictions and protocols, tactics, and tools that can assist in delivering important messages to the audiences we are trying to reach.
“It can also help to evaluate what types of awareness communications will be the best reach to audiences in their mother tongue… powerful things happen when communities come together in common interest, and that is parallel with the vision of His Highness the Amir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani,” al-Yakoub said.
According to al-Yakoub the meetings with the participating community leaders focused on tapping and discussing how an awareness programme would benefit residents and newly-arrived expats to Qatar.
“The programme will also help many communities living in Qatar learn about the internal rules and regulations to prevent any misguidance or any failure in practising the country’s laws and regulations. We will make sure to deliver a strong programme tailored to each community language for a better, fruitful result,” al-Yakoub said.
“Our public relations protocol is well-equipped, in collaboration of our subsidiary partners, in terms of PR-related subjects, so we can deliver rich information and guideline to the communities,” added Ahmed Alvi, PR & protocol head at KON.