Thirty students - 23 female and seven male - from Qatar University College of Business & Economics (QU-CBE) have designed and produced a health awareness campaign that aims to highlight the importance of daily physical exercise to prevent life-threatening diseases.

The initiative also encourages youth to adopt a healthy diet and lifestyle by adding simple things to their daily routine.

Themed “It Pays”, the campaign is in the form of a competition where students from the management and marketing department will compete against teams from 25 universities and secondary schools in Qatar.

In this regard, the CBE students developed a real advertising agency with various communications and marketing departments and launched My Walk, Stop Soda and several other initiatives that are part of the campaign.

QU president Dr Hassan al-Derham and CBE dean Dr Nitham Hindi were on hand to support the students at the Stop Soda booth and signed a pledge to stop drinking soda for one week.

The competition, which is organised by Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy, requires participants to work on real-life projects, get hands-on experience based on local market needs, design and execute an integrated marketing communications plan and analyse results.

If their projects are selected, they will present their research findings and creative ideas on December 8 in front of a jury of representatives from the Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy and Josoor Institute.

Dr Dalia Abdelrahman Farrag, CBE assistant professor of marketing and chair of the Student Outreach & Support committee, said: “This is an invaluable opportunity for our students to enhance their learning experience and introduce their ideas to the Qatari market. It also serves to advance their skills to be professionals, solid team players and good communicators.”

Shaed al-Rumaihi, a fourth-year marketing student, said “It Pays” promotes the idea that “a small change can really make a big difference in our lifestyle”. “The initiative, My Walk, encourages our QU colleagues to get involved in sporting activities and motivates them to consider walking as one of their important daily exercises.”