GottaDash
10-22-2008, 09:19 AM
PNA--UAE become the biggest source of foreign investment for Kurdistan.
In a single fell swoop earlier this summer, the UAE became the biggest source of foreign investment for the northern region of Iraq known as Kurdistan.
The announcement by Damac Properties of a US$4.5bn (Dh16.52bn) property development outside the capital city of Erbil has proven to be the beginning of a wave of investment by UAE companies looking to join in the economic revival of Iraq.
In recent weeks, the Abu Dhabi-based property developer, Al Maabar International, announced a $10bn project in Baghdad and Etisalat's chairman has said the company would take a major stake in Korek, Kurdish Telecom Company.
And Bunyan Real Estate, based in Dubai, has signed a memorandum of understanding for a project in Sulaimaniyah worth $2bn, according to Kurdish government officials.
"The UAE is the number one country for Iraq right now," said Mohammed Amin Baban, a senior economic adviser for strategic investment issues to Nechirvan Barzani, the Kurdistan regional government's (KRG) prime minister. "Erbil and Kurdistan are the crossroads into the rest of Iraq. Security is very good and the investment laws are here."
The Kurdish region has a semi-autonomous government and its own army, the peshmerga, giving it more stability than the rest of the country. But after decades of strife with Saddam Hussein and what Kurds like to describe as a double embargo - from Saddam Hussein's Baghdad and the rest of the world - the region has a badly damaged infrastructure network. Power is available only for about eight hours a day and the sewerage system is ancient and dysfunctional.
"For investors this is a virgin land," said Herish Muhamad, the chairman of the KRG's Board of Investment. "We need everything."
Attempts to draw in foreign investors thus far have been only relatively successful. Half-built structures haunt the city and residents complain of a lack of jobs and poverty. But the emergence of the UAE as a major investor has drawn attention from government officials, particularly in the agriculture sector.
"We want to renew Kurdistan to its former production capacity," said Othman Shwani, the minister of planning. "This will provide food security for all of Iraq, but we can also begin exporting to places like the Gulf countries."
The government's five-year plan is to get the farms of the Kurdish region up to the point where they can provide enough food for the population and then begin exporting. Already, the government is in talks to tie up with agriculture companies from Europe to improve the yields of the farms and is working on a way to export directly to Dubai. One UAE company, the Bin Khalid Trading Company, made a $3.5 million investment into agriculture in Duhok.
Mohammed Rauf, the minister of trade, said the government was shipping its first test samples of the agricultural projects to Dubai next month.
"We want to establish an economic integration with the UAE," he said. "We have the potential to produce a lot of agricultural produce and they need food because they have trouble growing things there."
The KRG was opening an Erbil Business Centre in Dubai this year and the government had bought two spaces at Global Village in Dubailand to promote trade, he said.
The UAE is taking a leading role in developing the energy sector in Kurdistan, too.
The Sharjah-based energy affiliates, Crescent Petroleum and Dana Gas, are spending $650 million to develop two Kurdistan gas fields, a pipeline and a gas-processing plant in an integrated gas and electricity development project. Late last month, the companies started producing gas from the Khor Mor field, located midway between Erbil and Sulaimaniyah, at an initial rate of 75 million cubic feet per day. They expect to quadruple production from the field in the first half of next year. The gas will supply two new power stations that are in the final stages of construction and will provide the region's first new electrical generating capacity to be built in 50 years.
Crescent and Dana also plan soon to inaugurate a "Gas City" project in Kurdistan to attract investment in gas-intensive industries such as petrochemicals and ceramics to the region.
The government is planning greater investments in tourism and industry with the selling point to international companies that they can set up their businesses in Erbil and work in the whole of Iraq.
"When we talk to people, we tell them that maybe there are four million or five million people in Kurdistan, but this is the gateway to the 30 million people of Iraq," said Mr Muhamad.
As violence slows down, more businesses are looking at doing work in the country and making investments, according to analysts .
http://www.peyamner.com/details.aspx?l=4&id=89511
In a single fell swoop earlier this summer, the UAE became the biggest source of foreign investment for the northern region of Iraq known as Kurdistan.
The announcement by Damac Properties of a US$4.5bn (Dh16.52bn) property development outside the capital city of Erbil has proven to be the beginning of a wave of investment by UAE companies looking to join in the economic revival of Iraq.
In recent weeks, the Abu Dhabi-based property developer, Al Maabar International, announced a $10bn project in Baghdad and Etisalat's chairman has said the company would take a major stake in Korek, Kurdish Telecom Company.
And Bunyan Real Estate, based in Dubai, has signed a memorandum of understanding for a project in Sulaimaniyah worth $2bn, according to Kurdish government officials.
"The UAE is the number one country for Iraq right now," said Mohammed Amin Baban, a senior economic adviser for strategic investment issues to Nechirvan Barzani, the Kurdistan regional government's (KRG) prime minister. "Erbil and Kurdistan are the crossroads into the rest of Iraq. Security is very good and the investment laws are here."
The Kurdish region has a semi-autonomous government and its own army, the peshmerga, giving it more stability than the rest of the country. But after decades of strife with Saddam Hussein and what Kurds like to describe as a double embargo - from Saddam Hussein's Baghdad and the rest of the world - the region has a badly damaged infrastructure network. Power is available only for about eight hours a day and the sewerage system is ancient and dysfunctional.
"For investors this is a virgin land," said Herish Muhamad, the chairman of the KRG's Board of Investment. "We need everything."
Attempts to draw in foreign investors thus far have been only relatively successful. Half-built structures haunt the city and residents complain of a lack of jobs and poverty. But the emergence of the UAE as a major investor has drawn attention from government officials, particularly in the agriculture sector.
"We want to renew Kurdistan to its former production capacity," said Othman Shwani, the minister of planning. "This will provide food security for all of Iraq, but we can also begin exporting to places like the Gulf countries."
The government's five-year plan is to get the farms of the Kurdish region up to the point where they can provide enough food for the population and then begin exporting. Already, the government is in talks to tie up with agriculture companies from Europe to improve the yields of the farms and is working on a way to export directly to Dubai. One UAE company, the Bin Khalid Trading Company, made a $3.5 million investment into agriculture in Duhok.
Mohammed Rauf, the minister of trade, said the government was shipping its first test samples of the agricultural projects to Dubai next month.
"We want to establish an economic integration with the UAE," he said. "We have the potential to produce a lot of agricultural produce and they need food because they have trouble growing things there."
The KRG was opening an Erbil Business Centre in Dubai this year and the government had bought two spaces at Global Village in Dubailand to promote trade, he said.
The UAE is taking a leading role in developing the energy sector in Kurdistan, too.
The Sharjah-based energy affiliates, Crescent Petroleum and Dana Gas, are spending $650 million to develop two Kurdistan gas fields, a pipeline and a gas-processing plant in an integrated gas and electricity development project. Late last month, the companies started producing gas from the Khor Mor field, located midway between Erbil and Sulaimaniyah, at an initial rate of 75 million cubic feet per day. They expect to quadruple production from the field in the first half of next year. The gas will supply two new power stations that are in the final stages of construction and will provide the region's first new electrical generating capacity to be built in 50 years.
Crescent and Dana also plan soon to inaugurate a "Gas City" project in Kurdistan to attract investment in gas-intensive industries such as petrochemicals and ceramics to the region.
The government is planning greater investments in tourism and industry with the selling point to international companies that they can set up their businesses in Erbil and work in the whole of Iraq.
"When we talk to people, we tell them that maybe there are four million or five million people in Kurdistan, but this is the gateway to the 30 million people of Iraq," said Mr Muhamad.
As violence slows down, more businesses are looking at doing work in the country and making investments, according to analysts .
http://www.peyamner.com/details.aspx?l=4&id=89511