Important economic decision expected in Iraq
(Baghdad: Al Furat News) The Iraqi government intends to restore the investment climate through new facilities to be offered during the coming period to the private sector in the medium and long-term projects, after the relative improvement in the security file in Baghdad and Iraqi cities.
An Iraqi official in Baghdad revealed that the government will provide a package of incentives and facilities to encourage both foreign and domestic investors. The plan aims at easing the pressure on the state in the reconstruction and development file, especially the liberated cities that have been heavily damaged.
The official, who declined to be named, said that Baghdad aspires to achieve a successful investment model, pointing out that the opening of Turkish Iranian Kuwaiti Jordanian to Iraq in this area more than other countries.
“It will include a tax exemption for investors, a commitment to provide an appropriate security environment, and guidance to government departments not to delay any transactions related to domestic investors’ business and to foreign investors in particular,” the official said.
This comes in conjunction with the escalation of demands in a number of Iraqi provinces aimed at implementing the law transfer of powers from the federal ministries to local governments in the provinces, in order to get rid of the excess rings and routine in relation to infrastructure projects and the organization of the work of institutions and service departments in the provinces in order to bring investment opportunities to their cities, And provide services to citizens to absorb their anger and frequent living protests.
Last year, parliament passed Law 21, which includes extending the powers of local governments to Iraq’s 18 provinces, including exercising executive power over government institutions without returning to the central government in Baghdad to bypass investment complexities.
The economic researcher Fuad Mohammed said in a press statement that “the transfer of powers to the provinces and disengagement from the center, is an opportunity to develop their cities and increase the demand for capital, especially as the cities of southern Iraq enjoy security stability compared with other cities.”
“The cities of Basra, Dhi Qar and Maysan have a geographical location that attracts a lot of investment because of the large oil wealth it owns.”
For his part, said MP from the Parliamentary Services Committee, Burhan Mamouri, in a press statement, “The reality of investment in Iraq in general does not rise to the required level, and will not be available if the government did not pay sufficient attention to security in all Iraqi provinces.” The most prominent demands of Iraqis in the protests in various provinces, which have continued sporadically since the ninth of July last, to provide jobs for the unemployed, and improve the level of services and living.
Al-Mamouri stressed that it is not possible to develop the Iraqi economy and address the financial problems if the country does not go to invest like other countries, to provide work and projects.
The Ministry of Planning issued a recent report, in which it showed that poverty rates rose in the cities occupied by the terrorist advocate to 41%, after not exceeding 20% before that. She pointed out that the poverty rate in the southern provinces amounted to 31.5%, and increased in the central governorates, Baghdad and the Kurdistan region at varying rates.
For his part, said a member of the Committee on Economy and Investment parliamentary, Salam al-Maliki, in a press statement, “There must be an attractive environment, and provide a security situation and good infrastructure,” stressing that the modernization of legislation is the biggest incentive to reassure the investor.
Maliki pointed out that Basra is one of the finest places that can be exploited in the investment side, because of the ports and oil. It also contains the basics of life, with border areas with three important states, as well as many other important things.
But he said: “The investor when he comes to these provinces hit a lot of procedures, both red tape and bureaucracy, or on the side of users at the head of power in the provincial councils and administrations, as some of them bargain investor to pay money and bribes in order to end the proceedings.
He stressed that “all this affected the work of the investor, which caused the loss of many economic opportunities to leave the southern arena and Basra, specifically,” calling on the government to open wider doors through the activation of the investment law, or work to provide channels attractive to capital, Port of Faw transport and construction projects
Alforatnews.com
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