The Communications Regulatory Authority (CRA) has published its “CRA Annual Report 2022”, which highlights a wide range of CRA’s achievements over the past year that saw multiple exceptional local, regional, and international events.
This year’s edition of the report is especially unique as it covers a significant twelve months for the State of Qatar. A top event was the hosting of the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022™ for the first time in an Arab country and it is understood the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) sector had tremendously contributed to the success of the tournament.
Overall, Qatar showed strong economic performance in 2022. Its economy grew at an unprecedented 4.8%. This was driven by a strong Q4, influenced by service sector activities related to the tournament. Real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) during Q4 grew at 2.7%, an increase of 8% over the same period in 2021.
In this regard, the ICT sector contributed to 1.3% of Qatar’s GDP in 2022, accounting for QAR 11.5bn — an increase of 11.4% over 2021.
Monitoring Qatar’s global rankings and key metrics, the report says Qatar’s investments in 5G infrastructure positioned it favorably in comparison with other regional countries, ranking first or second on key performance metrics.
CRA’s Annual Report 2022 is rich with information. It covers numerous pivots. One of them is the progress made within CRA Strategy 2020-2024 in light of the second National Development Strategy, which aims at developing a sustainable and high-quality infrastructure that supports the national economy and is capable of keeping abreast of the latest smart technologies.
In this regard, the report highlights the progress made with respect to the Cloud Policy and Framework in Qatar, which CRA released in 2022 following a public consultation in 2021.
The report tackles a wide range of CRA’s efforts to achieve a diversified, cloud-based economy. To that end, both Ooredoo Qatar Q.P.S.C. and Vodafone Qatar P.Q.S.C. have made significant improvements to their networks and operations. They have modernized their core networks, transitioning to a cloud-based architecture. They also have enhanced the capacity of their domestic and international IP transport links, ensuring fans have sufficient bandwidth to access popular Over-the-top (OTT) services throughout the tournament.
In 2022, Qatar’s technology markets build on their achievements from 2021. There was progress in the government's strategy to drive digital transformation as a key enabler of economic diversification.
The report shows in detail the powerful progress made on all roles and responsibilities assigned to CRA such as monitoring the Quality of Service (QoS), consumer protection, Qatari domain names, spectrum management, radio equipment approval, customs clearance, and many others.
For more information, please view the full version of the “CRA Annual Report 2022” through this link.
