Qatar is fighting obesity with its first vegan cafe

Qatar opened its first vegan cafe Evergreen Organics, located at Qanat Quartier on the Pearl-Qatar, and it not only looks amazing, but may be playing a part in combating the country's prevailing public health issues.

The aim of the cafe is to get people in the country eating and thinking healthy, while presenting them with a delicious opportunity. Qatar repeatedly comes in as one of the top 5 fattest  countries in the world, with over 55 percent of its adult males being classified as obese. 

Qatar's government has launched a number of public health programs to combat the problem. These are detailed in The National Health Strategy, 2010-2016  which Sheikha Moza bint Nasser backs and spearheads.

Some experts chalk the obesity issue up to perceptions about traditional diets, and believe that obesity prevention starts with changing some entrenched behaviors.

"Sometimes, in changing [their ways], people feel they are not loyal to their grandfathers," Sheikh Mohammed Hamad J Al Thani, director of public health at the Supreme Council of Health in Qatar, told Al Jazeera in 2015.

Evergreen Organics may be playing a small but worthy part in this.

"We want to take people back to nature and reconnect them with earth-to-table concepts, where everything comes from earth directly to your plates, rather than going through the processes of the food you see in the market now which is scary," Ghanim Al Sulaiti, co-founder of Evergreen Organics, told Doha News .

The place is decked out with recycled materials and plants, making it very evergreen.

Dairy-free never looked so good.