Industrial Radiography Supervisor Licence Conditions in Qatar
October 5, 2026
11 min read
DITEC Experts, Radiation Protection Team, ALDuha Institute for Training and Environmental Consulting
Why this one role carries five separate conditions
One point before anything else. Meeting the conditions in the Decision is what you can prepare for. Whether a licence is granted, and when, is a decision of the competent authority alone, and nothing in this explanation and nothing in any course is a commitment that a licence will be issued or that it will be issued within a given period. What this article does is set out the condition as the instrument states it and point to the training that bears on it.
Industrial radiography is among the most demanding radiation practices to control: it takes high activity sealed sources out of their shields on work sites not built for them, in the hands of a crew working at night, in a plant that belongs to somebody else, behind a barrier the crew put up themselves an hour earlier. The pattern that recurs in incidents in this practice is this: a source that did not return to its shield, and nobody on site who was both able to notice that and authorised to stop the job. The supervisor is the answer the Qatari framework gives to the second half of that sentence.
The conditions themselves are not in the Radiation Protection Law and not in the 2003 Executive Regulation. They are in a separate instrument, Decision 4 of 2007, whose preamble records that it was issued having regard to the Regulation and in particular to Article 25 of it, and on the recommendation of the Radiation Protection Committee. Its first operative article then does one thing only: the conditions for licences to work in the fields of radiation work, attached to this Decision, shall apply. So the conditions live in the schedule attached to the Decision, not in the two short articles that issue it, and a reader who stops at the two articles finds nothing and concludes wrongly that nothing was published.
The schedule divides the field into industrial applications and medical applications. Industrial applications open with industrial radiography, and industrial radiography opens with the supervisor. This article takes that one entry, item 1, and reads it condition by condition.
The opening formula, and what it decides
Item 1 opens with a formula that is repeated in every entry of the schedule: the following conditions must be present in the person who is granted a licence to work as an industrial radiography supervisor. Three things in that sentence are worth slowing down for, because each of them decides an argument that comes up in practice.
The first is that the conditions attach to the person, not to the employer. The subject of the sentence is the one in whom the conditions must be present. A company cannot hold a supervisor licence on behalf of a crew, and a crew cannot share one. The second is that the formula requires the conditions to be present in that person, which is cumulative: the five conditions are joined, not alternatives, and item 1 contains no word of alternation at all. Other entries in the same schedule do contain one, and that contrast is the subject of a later article in this series. The third is that the licence is granted for work as a named role, which ties it to that function. A person licensed as a radiographer is not a supervisor because the site calls him one.
The five conditions, read one by one
The academic condition is that he hold the first university degree in engineering or sciences, at minimum. The field is fixed to engineering or sciences and the level is a first university degree, and the phrase at minimum raises the floor without opening the field: a master's degree in engineering satisfies it, a diploma does not, and a first degree in an unrelated field is not in the two named families at all. Note that this is the strictest academic condition in the whole radiography group: the radiographer below the supervisor needs a diploma on the track for practices after the Law, and the assistant needs a general secondary certificate on both of his tracks.
The technical qualification is that he hold a Level III certificate in industrial radiography from an approved centre. Two separate things are required here and they are commonly collapsed into one. The Decision asks for a certificate at Level III in industrial radiography, and it asks that the certificate come from a centre the authority recognises. A Level III certificate from a body the Ministry does not recognise for that certificate does not satisfy the condition, and recognition is a question to put to the Ministry about the named certificate and the named centre together.
The radiation protection condition is that he pass a radiation protection course in industrial applications from an approved centre. This is the condition most often treated as already met because the radiography qualification contains some radiation safety content. It is a distinct condition with a distinct subject: the course the Decision names is a radiation protection course in industrial applications, and the word in the text is that he pass it, not that he attend it. A certificate of attendance with no assessment does not show that the course was passed, and that is the single most common defect we see on a file.
The experience condition is that he have practical experience in the field of industrial radiography of not less than five years, and the medical condition is that he pass the prescribed medical examination. The experience is qualified twice over: practical, and in the field of industrial radiography. Five years in non-destructive testing that did not involve radiography is not in the field the condition names. The medical condition says the examination is the prescribed one, so its content is set elsewhere and not in this Decision. Ask the Ministry which examination is prescribed, by what standard, and at what interval, and keep the answer in writing with the licence file.
The supervisor against the two roles below him
The three radiography entries are best read together, because the schedule builds them as a ladder and the differences between the rungs are where the practical questions sit. The table compares the three on the four conditions that differ. It is a reading of items 1 to 3 of the industrial applications and nothing is added to it.
Items 1 to 3 compared on the conditions that differ
| Condition | Supervisor, item 1 | Radiographer and assistant, items 2 and 3 |
|---|---|---|
| Academic level | First university degree in engineering or sciences, at minimum | Diploma for the radiographer after the Law, secondary certificate for the assistant |
| Radiography qualification | Certificate at Level III | Level II course for the radiographer, Level I course for the assistant |
| Experience | Five years, practical, in the field of industrial radiography | One year for the radiographer after the Law, and no experience condition on the assistant |
| Two tracks before and after the Law | Item 1 has a single track and no reference to the two periods | Both entries are split into a track before the Law and a track after it |
What to do with this before you write to the Ministry
The condition is one thing and the file that demonstrates it is another. Below is the order we use when a client asks us to look at a supervisor file before it is submitted. It is the Institute's own working practice, not a requirement of the Decision, and the Decision imposes no form of file at all.
Preparing a supervisor file
Read the five conditions as five separate questions
- Write each condition at the head of a page in the Arabic wording of the Decision, then put under it the document that answers that condition and nothing else. A file arranged by document rather than by condition hides the gap, because one certificate appears to answer two conditions.
- The condition most often left unanswered this way is the radiation protection course, because the radiography certificate is placed under both it and the Level III condition.
Ask about recognition before you pay for a course
- Recognition is given for a named course at a named centre. Ask the Ministry in the Arabic wording of the Decision, name the course and the centre, and keep the reply. A centre recognised for one course is not thereby recognised for another.
Document experience as years in the named field
- The condition is five years of practical experience in the field of industrial radiography. A letter that says five years in quality control is not evidence of the field the condition names. Ask the previous employer for dates, the practice, and the source types worked with.
Settle the medical examination in writing
- The Decision calls it the prescribed examination and does not describe it. Ask which examination, by what standard, by whom it is carried out, and at what interval it is repeated, and keep the written answer with the file rather than relying on what a clinic usually does.
Questions we are asked about this item
Does a Level III certificate on its own qualify a supervisor?
No. Item 1 lists five conditions joined together, and the Level III certificate answers one of them. The same person still needs a first university degree in engineering or sciences, a pass in a radiation protection course in industrial applications, five years of practical experience in the field, and the prescribed medical examination. Whether the licence is then granted is for the competent authority to decide.
Can an employer hold the supervisor licence for its crew?
The wording attaches the conditions to a person: they must be present in the one who is granted a licence to work as an industrial radiography supervisor. A licence tied to conditions about a person's degree, certificate, experience and medical fitness cannot be held by a company, and a crew working on a site where no licensed supervisor is present is not covered by a licence held by someone who is elsewhere.
Is the radiation protection course the same as the radiography course?
They are two conditions in the same item, and the Decision names them differently: one is a certificate at Level III in industrial radiography, the other is a radiation protection course in industrial applications. The second is not satisfied by radiation safety content inside the first. Put them under two separate headings in the file and you will see immediately whether you hold two documents or one.
Where is the medical examination described?
Not in this Decision. Item 1 requires him to pass the prescribed medical examination and stops there, which means the content is set by another instrument or by a decision of the authority. Request the examination in force from the Ministry and keep a copy with the licence file, and treat any summary that attributes a specific test or frequency to this Decision as wrong.
Does a master's degree in engineering satisfy the academic condition?
The condition sets a first university degree in engineering or sciences as a minimum, so a higher degree in one of the two named families is above the floor rather than outside it. What the phrase at minimum does not do is widen the field: a higher degree in a family the condition does not name is not reached by it. If your qualification sits on the edge of engineering or sciences, put the question to the Ministry with the transcript rather than assuming either way.
How the Institute can help
Two findings recur on supervisor files. The first is the collapsed condition: one certificate placed under both the Level III condition and the radiation protection condition, so the file looks complete and answers four conditions out of five. The second is experience documented as a job title rather than as years in the field the condition names, which is the form of evidence that is hardest to repair after the previous employer has been left.
The Institute delivers radiation protection training for industrial applications, reviews a licence file against the conditions of Decision 4 of 2007 condition by condition, drafts the enquiry to the Ministry about a named course and a named centre, and advises on the written records that demonstrate experience. Level I, II and III industrial radiography certification is a separate qualification obtained from a centre that provides it, and the Institute does not issue it.
Scope of what the Institute does: training and consulting. Field radiation surveys are carried out through specialist partners. The Institute does not carry out laboratory analysis, instrument calibration or equipment testing.
A technical note. The conditions in this Decision are licensing conditions, not site work instructions. Meeting them, and the licence that may follow, replaces nothing in operational protection: every exposure has a controlled-area boundary that is monitored with a working survey meter, and the exposure is not finished, and the site is not approached, until a measurement confirms that the source has returned to its shield. The return of the source is not inferred from a mechanical indicator, from resistance felt on the crank, or from counting turns. These are obligations on the licensee under the Law, the Regulation and the conditions of his own licence, and their place is not this Decision.
A note on one word. The Decision repeatedly requires a course to be taken from a centre it describes with an Arabic word that this explanation renders as approved. The Decision does not name who gives that approval and does not say whether it is a general status or given for a particular course. In the Decision this description qualifies the training centre and no other body. The English word is a rendering chosen for this explanation and is not a term of art: our practical reading is to ask in the Arabic wording of the Decision, naming the specific course and the specific centre, and to keep the answer in writing, because what the instrument leaves open the authority settles. The Institute is a licensed training provider and describes itself that way and no other way.
A note on the authority named in the text. The word the Decision uses for the authority is the Council. It is the word of a 2007 instrument whose preamble refers to the Executive Regulation issued by decision of the President of the Supreme Council for the Environment and Natural Reserves, number 4 of 2003. The body that word names no longer exists. Competence today sits with the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change, and the unit concerned is named in the organisational decisions as the Radiation Protection Department. The word Council is kept only where this explanation renders what the instrument itself says, because that is the instrument's own word; in the Institute's own advice it is written as the Ministry. Read Council as the Ministry throughout.
This explanation is published for awareness by the radiation protection team at ALDuha Institute for Training and Environmental Consulting. The English text is an explanation, not a certified translation: the Arabic text published in the Official Gazette governs in case of any difference, and the official Arabic wording of every condition discussed here is quoted in full on the Arabic version of this article. This explanation is introductory. It is not a legal opinion, it does not replace the conditions of your own licence, and it does not replace review by the regulator. Last updated 5 October 2026.