Qatar is spending a stunning $500 million per week for the priciest World Cup yet
While hosting a FIFA World Cup often means building a batch of new, state-of-the-art stadiums, Qatar's preparations go far beyond that.
Not only are they building stadiums, but major infrastructure projects like roads, railways, airports, seaports and hospitals must get done by the 2022 World Cup too. And to do that, Qatar is spending an eye-popping $500 million per week.
To put that into perspective, Qatar is looking at spending $200 billion by the time the tournament kicks off, which is 19 times more than Russia is projected to spend ($10.7 billion) and 18 times more than Brazil spent ($11 billion).
That means the 2022 World Cup in Qatar will be the most expensive iteration of the event ever, and it won't be even remotely close.
The head of finance for Qatar's 2022 World Cup told the BBC that pace of spending – $500 million per week – will continue for the next three to four years to get ready for the tournament on time.
"We are giving ourselves a good chance to deliver things on time," Ali Shareef Al-Emadi said. "We don't want to be in a place where we start painting when people are coming to the country."
Of the projects planned, the contracts for 90 percent of them have been awarded, he added. Qatar are likely avoiding a repeat of what happened in Brazil, where they had far less work to do, but fell behind schedule and struggled to get stadiums ready in time.
The World Cup in Qatar is still another five and a half years away, but the amount of work they plan to do and the money they plan to spend – all just for the one-month tournament – is certainly unprecedented and stunning.
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