The International Monetary Fund announced in July that it has approved a three-year, $5.34 billion loan for Iraq under the Stand-By Arrangement facility, which it said was focused on “implementing economic and financial policies to help the country cope with lower oil prices and ensure debt sustainability.” The promised financial assistance was made conditional on—among other things—Baghdad settling all debts to international oil companies (IOCs) without adding new debts. To satisfy that…
Tag: oil revenues
Thamir Al-Ghadhban
The Chairman of the steering committee that formulated Iraq’s first Integrated National Energy Strategy (INES) and head of the Prime Minister’s Advisory Commission (PMAC), Thamir Al-Ghadhban, explains in an interview in Baghdad with Ruba Husari, editor of Iraq Oil Forum, the formulation, the dynamics and the political risks impacting the strategy. Q: What is the Integrated National Energy Strategy and how did it come about? A: When we say a strategy…
Budget 2011: Who Gets What
The Iraqi 2011 federal budget voted by parliament today includes two items that are related to payments to oil companies. It stipulates a payment of $1.75 billion as participation in the production cost of oil exported including under contracts of international oil companies signed with the Kurdistan region. The second item is an allocation of $2.73 billion for investment projects of international oil companies. The budget assumes the export of…
Iraq-India: Special Friends
15 December 2000 A deal reached with India last month could set the ball rolling for a new type of arrangement between Baghdad and “friendly countries.” In return for the award of an exploration contract in the western desert, India could trade wheat and rice for Iraqi oil outside the UN oil-for-food program, Iraqi sources say. New Delhi is now talking to the UN about applying for a sanctions waiver,…