Intro:

The Secretary General of the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, Hassan al Thawadi, spoke to SNTV on Sunday about the progress being made in the country.

Script:

SOUNDBITE: (Arabic) Hassan al Thawadi, Secretary General of Qatar 2022:

"We know for sure that fan zones are part of FIFA requirements. 2014 is a starting point for us because we had a chance to experiment with using cooling systems in the fan zones. We have already a successful example of a cooling system which you can find at Al Sadd Club, the Jassem bin Hamad Stadium. We are currently trying to improve this system to make it more effective. There are two fan zones in Qatar, one in Katara and another one in the area next to Aspire. They actually use two different cooling systems. Both systems are working successfully. They proved to be successful in hot and humid climate. The other thing we noticed from creating these fan zones was the great love for football and fantastic interaction between the fans and how much they loved coming to a place with a temperate climate to watch football together. I think the 2014 experiment was successful and we have eight years before 2022 to improve these cooling technologies so that it could be used in a wider area."