The growth of the Mena Golf Tour promises more visibility for sponsors

No longer do they have to climb mountains to chase their dreams. The MENA Golf Tour has provided the perfect vehicle the region’s talent needed to scale new highs in their careers, making the challenge par for the course.

A record number of entries, extensive media exposure and, above all, enthusiasm for the game shows the tour has grown exponentially and is well on course to achieving its aim of discovering and identifying hidden golfing gems in the sands of Arabia.

The journey to unearth these jewels on the region’s fairways began in 2011 when the MENA Golf Tour, as the initiative by the Shaikh Maktoum Golf Foundation is called, but the challenge to maintain the momentum and take it to a whole new level has just begun.

And the organisers are well aware of the task that lies ahead.

“It is a tour in its own right and, the only one which is open to amateurs as well. We want to develop amateurs who represent their country in the region. They are the ones who will encourage more people to take up golf,” says Mohamed Juma Buamaim, chairman of the tour.

“Certainly we want overseas players to join the tour simply because we don’t have enough scratch amateurs and the majority of professionals in the region are teaching pros. You just couldn’t make a tour from that.  We also need players who have already played on different tours to give it more strength,” he said

“For us the tour is a mission, a mission to make golf part of the social fabric, which, in turn, will help produce a future generation of champions. It’s not a quixotic challenge so long we have the support of the corporate world from both within and outside the region.

“We invite all business houses and golf-loving individuals to further the MENA Golf Tour brand which has an unlimited potential. In turn, they are guaranteed on-site visibility of their products and significant exposure in both print and electronic media.

The world’s leading television channels, including OSN Sports and Ten Sports, air the highlight packages of the tour to a worldwide audience, generating massive exposure for the Tour, which is going from strength to strength.

The MENA Golf Tour, which has expanded from four events in its inaugural year in 2011 to 10 in 2014, covering a vast expanse of the region that includes stops in Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Oman and Qatar besides the UAE, offers a range of sponsorship opportunities for international and regionally-based companies wishing to promote and market their brand to a highly-targeted audience.

“It is all about a value that we intend to bring to the players so that they can have better endorsements, better sponsorship and more visibility for the region’s golf as the tour has already hit the right notes with players from different parts of the world signing up for its events,” Mr Buamaim added.

Affiliated to R&A, the worldwide golf governing body based in the home of golf, St Andrews, and the Arab Golf Federation, the 2014 edition of the tour resumes in mid-September with the eight-week ‘Gulf Swing’ including four stops in the UAE and one each in Qatar, Oman and Saudi Arabia before returning to the UAE for the season-ending Tour championship in November at Al Ain Equestrian, Shooting and Golf Club.

Please contact Richard Mulholland, Assistant Manager, Tournament Operations on richard.mulholland@menagolftour.com for more details on the sponsorship opportunities.

Pic caption: His Highness Shaikh Nahyan bin Mubarak Al Nahyan, Minister of Culture, Youth and Community Development, presented the winner’s trophy to Mustapha El Maouas, the 2013 MENA Golf Tour Amateur Order of Merit champion, in the presence of Shaikh Fahim bin Sultan Al Qasimi, chairman of the Emirates Golf Federation, Khalfan Al Kaabi, a board member of the federation, Mohamed Juma Bumaim, chairman of the MENA Golf Tour, and Saeed Al Aryani of Al Ain Equestrian, Shooting and Golf Club