The Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy (SC) and Qatar Shell have teamed up to deliver a high-level health and safety workshop for senior SC employees and a host of local and international contractors engaged on projects linked to the 2022 FIFA World Cup Qatar™.

Hosted by SC Secretary General H.E. Hassan Al Thawadi and delivered by Shell's Maarten Wetselaar, Integrated Gas & New Energies Director, the participants analysed the lessons learnt from the successful health and safety records of the two organisations – both of which are central to Qatar's development plans in line with Qatar National Vision 2030 – and discussed the importance of an organisational culture and leadership approach that values health and safety.

The workshop, titled 'Safety has no Boundaries' and held on Shell's Global Safety Awareness Day on 3 May, also discussed how best practice from across industries and markets can be applied on SC projects, and how to harness the collective health and safety culture across 2022 FIFA World Cup™ construction projects.

The workshop was attended by over 60 contractors and SC employees. Contractors who attended the workshop included: HBK; Sixco; Al Balagh; Al Jaber Eng; Midmac; Tekfen; J&P; Larsen & Toubro; China Railway Construction Corporation, Gulf Contracting and Nakheel.

The workshop comes at an important time on the SC's 2022 FIFA World Cup™ preparations, with 2018 being the busiest construction year on the project. Main Contractors are now engaged on every SC project, and it is expected that a record number of workers will be on site.

Commenting on the partnership, SC Secretary General H.E. Hassan Al Thawadi said: "The Supreme Committee has an industry leading health and safety record and in 2017 alone we conducted over 500 health and safety inspections on site, equating to nearly 2,500 hours of inspections. We have always considered the health and safety of every worker engaged on the 2022 FIFA World Cup project to be of the utmost important, and are always looking for ways to improve, and hope this collaboration with Maarten and his team at Shell will ensure we continue to develop new ways to further embed a health and safety culture at the SC and across all of our projects."

Al Thawadi added: "I'd like to thank all of the participants for coming and look forward to continuing this HSSE knowledge sharing partnership with Shell."

Maarten Wetselaar of Shell added: "Health and safety have always been a priority for Shell and runs through everything we do in Qatar. Like the SC, we expect our contractors to meet our own high safety standards. I greatly respect what the Secretary General and the team are doing in terms of strengthening health and safety performance and also in demonstrating care for workers. We hope that the SC team can benefit from collaborating with us and I have absolutely no doubt we can learn from each other."

Sheikh Ali Bin Hamad K. Al Thani, President of HBK Contracting Co. W.L.L., Lead Partners of the JV constructing the iconic Lusail Stadium, where the first and final match of the 2022 FIFA World Cup™ will take place, said: "As a Qatari company it's essential that we take a leadership approach in such an important area. Lusail is going to be an iconic stadium when it's complete and it's my organisation's mission to ensure we deliver it with an exceptional health and safety record. Workshops like the one hosted by the SC and Shell are great ways for us all to share knowledge and discuss best practice and I look forward to future sessions and further collaboration between those in attendance."

The Supreme Committee currently has over 25,000 workers engaged on eight stadium sites and other 2022 FIFA World Cup™ related projects. Main contractor works will be completed at another two venues in 2018 (Al Wakrah and Al Bayt Stadiums), with a further two reaching the same milestone in 2019 (Qatar Foundation and Al Rayyan Stadiums).