Doha: After more than ten days, the Souq Waqif date fair is crowded with visitors, including locals and foreigners. The date fair, which started in the last week of July, was expected to conclude on August 10 and saw a huge rush during the weekends. On Thursday and Friday, the visitors who poured in from noon continued till late at night. Various varieties of dates were in demand at the fest where 81 farms from different parts of Qatar participated.
Apart from dates, various fruits also attracted visitors to the fair. Khalas, Shishi, Khanishi, Barhi etc. were mainly in demand. Apart from this, the stalls selling date ice cream, juice, cake, milk shake, jam and pickles were very busy. Faisal Muhammad, Operations Manager, Memos Factory, who is participating in the fair, said that the variety of experiments is more attractive to the visitors. He also explained that since the start of the fair on July 21, there has been a huge demand for date related products every day. Besides the native citizens and residents of Qatar, the fair also has visitors from GCC countries.
Entry to the fair is from 3 pm to 9 pm on normal days. Fridays are from 1 PM to 10 PM. As Friday was a holiday, many people from outside Doha came to the fair. Yasir, a visitor from Malappuram, told ‘Gulf Madhyamya’ that the specialty of the fair is that good quality products are available at prices starting from 5 riyals. He had come to buy dates for his relatives and others just before his journey home. 58 tons of dates were sold in five days after the exhibition in the market. The Ministry of Municipalities had stated in the notice that only 15 tonnes were sold on Sunday.