Doha has implemented a wave of job cuts across its transport, energy and healthcare sectors as the government looks to reduce spending amid lower oil revenues.

Qatar Railways Company (Qatar Rail) has announced that 50 employees have been sacked as part of a “business efficiency review”.

The 50 layoffs are happening “at all levels” and with immediate effect, although no Qatari nationals will be affected, a Qatar Rail spokesperson told local daily Doha News.

The announcement from Qatar Rail comes amid reports of plans to lay off more than 1,000 expatriate staff in the country’s healthcare sector.

Jobs have been reportedly cut amid a reorganisation of Qatar’s public healthcare sector – at the not-for-profit hospital managing company Hamad Medical Corporation and the $2.5bn Sidra Medical & Research Centre, which is currently under construction.

Persistently low oil prices have already prompted job cuts at energy companies in Qatar. State-owned Qatar Petroleum (QP) laid off an estimated 3,000 jobs in 2015.

QP subsidiary RasGas and Danish energy and shipping company Maersk also cut jobs in 2015.

More layoffs are expected at energy companies in 2016.

Earlier this year, staff at state-controlled media company Al-Jazeera said 700 employees working at the discontinued channel Al-Jazeera America are expected to lose their jobs.

Qatar Museums has also cut staff numbers by at least 400 employees, according to a report in the UK’s Financial Times that cited anonymous sources.

The announcement on the restructuring at Qatar Rail comes less than two weeks after the UAE’s Etihad Rail announced it was laying off most of its expatriate workforce.

On 26 January, the Washington-based World Bank marked down its forecast for the average price of oil in 2016, saying it expected the average price of a barrel would be $37.

In its previous forecast, which was announced in October 2015, it had forecast that the average price in 2016 would be $51 a barrel.

Qatar relies on oil and gas for more than 70 per cent of its export earnings.