Qatar’s Baladna to invest $3.3bn in Syrian farming project as Gulf flows grow

Baladna Food Industries has announced a $3.3 billion investment to develop a 2,400 square kilometre farming and food-processing project in Syria that will produce cotton, wheat, textiles and dairy products, the company said. The venture, run by new subsidiary Baladna Syria, will mostly be located on land in the Euphrates River Basin in Raqqa and Deir Ezzor governorates and covers roughly 1.3 per cent of Syria’s territory. The project is expected to employ thousands and include direct acquisitions, contracted production with local farmers and a dairy factory in central Syria.

"Having the resources alone is not enough to ensure food security and self-sufficiency," said Kamel Al Abdullah, chief executive of Baladna Syria, in comments at the Agritek expo in Damascus. He added that the project will conform to international standards and use more "precise" agriculture aided by artificial intelligence to raise productivity.

The initiative is led by Baladna Food Industries, chaired by Syrian-Qatari businessman Moutaz Al Khayyat, with his brother Ramez Al Khayyat serving as company president. Kamel Al Abdullah described the project as part of a broader Gulf push into Syria's agriculture and infrastructure sectors, noting Baladna’s plans to contract local farmers across the country, supply them with inputs and know‑how, and acquire farmland in coastal regions with higher rainfall and richer soils.

• Scale and scope: 2,400 sq km in total area, focused on the Euphrates basin in eastern Syria; primary outputs to include cotton, sugar and wheat, with fruit and vegetables planned for coastal zones.
• Employment and supply chain: Thousands of jobs are anticipated, with a mix of company-owned operations and contract farming; Baladna will provide materials and technical support to local producers.
• Partnerships and financing: Baladna has signalled it will seek additional funding from international banks and this May signed a memorandum of understanding with the UAE agribusiness Al Dahra to jointly develop and share farming techniques and assets in Syria and other countries.
• Corporate position: Baladna’s shares were trading at 1.23 Qatari riyals on the day the announcement was reported.

Al Abdullah framed the programme as central to national recovery ambitions, saying he expected agriculture to drive "economic recovery and social stability". He emphasised the need for stabilisation and consistent development policies to rebuild infrastructure and education, and argued that Syria has the natural endowments to expand production: soil diversity, a suitable climate, water resources from the Euphrates and accumulated farming knowledge.

The announcement comes amid shifting regional investment flows into Syria following political developments and changes to international engagement, and against a backdrop in which agriculture accounted for 43 per cent of Syria’s GDP in 2024, up from 21 per cent in 2011. Baladna’s project targets areas that were long neglected under previous administrations but that produce much of the country’s agricultural and energy output.

Looking ahead, Baladna intends to scale production across multiple regions, combine agricultural production with industrial processing and research, and deploy technologies including AI to boost yields. The company said the scale of operations and planned upgrades in farming techniques could lift productivity nationwide if stabilisation and investment continue.