Qatar Animal Welfare Society Faces Threat of Closure After 22 Years Due to Registration and Financial Struggles

The Qatar Animal Welfare Society (QAWS) is facing possible closure after 22 years of rescuing and caring for animals in Qatar, as mounting bills and registration challenges leave the society struggling to continue. Around 450 animals are currently living under the society’s care, according to QAWS co-founder Janet Berry, who told Doha News that the organisation had reached a point where its current way of operating was no longer sustainable.

“QAWS is facing closure because it is simply not sustainable to continue operating without legal registration,” Berry told Doha News. “For 22 years, we have been trying to establish a non-profit society dedicated to animal rescue and welfare in Qatar, so that we can operate legally, transparently and sustainably.”

In a statement shared on Facebook, QAWS detailed a series of immediate and outstanding bills that it says it is currently unable to pay. Bills currently due include QAR 700 for cat litter, QAR 3,500 for dog food and QAR 5,600 for diesel, all of which the society says will be due again within seven days. The society also owes QAR 8,000 for farm animal feed and more than QAR 45,000 in veterinary bills, while food and cleaning supplies for the baboons in its care cost around QAR 1,000 every week. “We can’t continue like this,” the organisation said in its statement.

With nearly 450 animals relying on QAWS for food, shelter, safety and a second chance, Berry said the possibility of the organisation closing was difficult to contemplate. “The prospect of having to close is therefore not simply about an organisation ceasing to operate — it is about what happens to hundreds of animals who have nowhere else to go,” Berry said. “We promised they would never be abandoned again and somehow we need to honour that.”

QAWS has operated in Qatar for more than two decades, taking in abandoned and rescued animals, providing veterinary treatment and working to rehabilitate and rehome those in its care. The organisation began almost unintentionally, Berry said, when she and her daughter Kelly started helping animals in need. “My daughter, Kelly, and I started this unintentionally and never knew what it would become,” Berry told Doha News. “We are proud of what we do but didn’t realise it would be this difficult to register.”

In its public statement, QAWS said it has spent 22 years attempting to find a suitable framework under which to register its work. “We can’t be commercial. We can’t be educational. We can’t be tourism based. And there is no framework to allow a not-for-profit animal organisation.” Speaking to Doha News, Berry said there may be other avenues available, but argued that they would not provide the structure QAWS says it needs for its work.

“There may be other commercial registration routes that could potentially be pursued, but none would provide the legal structure we need to operate transparently and as a genuine animal rescue shelter,” Berry said. “We cannot simply reclassify what we do into an alternative commercial model when our purpose is rescue, rehabilitation and rehoming and our need is for a purpose-built animal housing facility.”

QAWS said it has held meetings, delivered presentations, completed environmental studies, developed its organisational framework, put together a board of Qatari directors and filed applications over the years in an effort to formalise its operations. “We want to be accountable. To be transparent. To be regulated. To be recognised. To build a sustainable shelter and secure the future of QAWS,” the organisation said in its Facebook statement.

Alongside its ongoing registration issue, QAWS says it is struggling to meet the recurring costs of caring for the animals already depending on the shelter. “We’re not operating comfortably,” QAWS said in its Facebook statement. QAWS said its current status prevents it from asking for or accepting monetary donations, even as it continues to take responsibility for animals in need. After more than two decades of operating, Berry said QAWS is now looking for a way to secure the organisation’s future without changing the purpose for which it was created.

“For 22 years, we have continued this work because the need is there,” Berry told Doha News. “We have cared for thousands of animals, and today around 450 are relying on us. We desperately want to find a sustainable legal solution that allows QAWS to continue its work properly and openly.”