Dorce Prefabricated Building and Construction Industry, Trade INC. has successfully completed numerous international projects to date and has began construction of 5 new projects in Mauritania and Iraq.

The company’s General Manager, Suheyla Cebi Karahan, emphasized the importance of these projects with the following words, “Dorce has the ability to follow a high quality policy under difficult circumstances in Iraq, Africa and the Middle East. Dorce will carry itself to a higher status and will introduce itself in a better way an international level with its completed projects.”

Dorce Prefabricated Building and Construction Industry, Trade INC. will be completing a total of 20 reinforced concrete and steel of vehicle inspection stations in 18 cities throughout Iraq including the construction of infrastructure and superstructure works for The Iraqi Ministry of Interior.

Dorce has undertaken the consruction of a housing project consisting of a 1416 villas and 11 social structures in Basrah Iraq. Under the scope of this project; all schools, villas, shopping, business and cultural centres will be reinforced concrete including the completion of all infrastructure and superstructure works and will further be put into service of Republic of Iraq-Establisment of Martyrs.

Dorce will be completing its third project again in Iraq- Basra. A general 400-bed Hospital project has been awarded to Dorce, including all infrastructure, superstructure works and technological devices.

Dorce, also has been executing two more important projects for the mining sector in the Guelb and Tasiast region in Mauritania. The company has become one of the initiators of business from Europe to Africa by procuring construction materials from both Turkey and Mauritania and from district countries in the region of the project areas.

Both projects will be put into service in a turnkey manner. Execution of the process buildings’ infrastructure and superstructure in the Guelb project area has commenced. A pre-engineered 6800 turn-key workers camp will be completed by Dorce in the Tasiast project site including all infrastructure and superstructure construction.

(Source: Dorce)

The following article was published by Reidar Visser, an historian of Iraq educated at the University of Oxford and currently based at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs. It is reproduced here with the author’s permission. Any opinions expressed are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the views of Iraq Business News.

Iraq Gets A New De-Baathification Board but the Supreme Court Becomes a Parody

It’s an indication of why Iraq is not unraveling completely: In the midst of political crisis, the Iraqi parliament today actually managed to approve a new de-Baathification board. The decision on the issue had been stalled since 2009. After the death of former director Ali al-Lami in May 2011 an acting official close to Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki had taken care of the de-Baathification file.

Of the seven new members who were nominated by the cabinet, two were Kurds. Those were incidentally the same Kurdish candidates that were nominated back in 2009. Today’s official parliament report mentions only one of these two and some press reports say one candidacy was withdrawn by the cabinet.

Accordingly, it is quite possible only 6 members were agreed after all, which in itself is legally dubious. At any rate, two other members of the new board are close to the secular Iraqiyya party: Muzahim Darwish al-Jibburi, a former minister of state who lost his job after the cabinet was downsized last summer, and Faris Abd al-Sattar, a lawyer from Mosul who has previously worked for the Nujayfi brothers there. The remaining three commission members are connected with Shiite Islamist circles.

Falah Hassan Shanshal is a Sadrist. He is considered a hardliner in de-Baathification issues and is seen as a frontrunner for the presidency of the commission. Like several other members he is a victim of the former regime in the sense that he has been previously imprisoned. Jabbar al-Muhmamadawi is also thought to have ties to the Sadrist milieu whereas Basim Muhammad al-Badri is probably linked to the Daawa.

The National Investment Commission is pleased to announce the investment opportunity to construct a complete residential complex for the employees of the Shiite Endowments Directorate in Baghdad – Karrada district within a total area of (60) acres in accordance with the Investment law No. 13 of 2006 as amended and according to the requirements set below:

1. The project includes the establishment of a residential complex of vertical eight-storey buildings each
2. Number of units to be implemented is (2400) housing units with areas of (125 m ², 175 m ², 225 m ²)
3. Constructing schools for the three phases with nurseries – medical centre – a shopping and marketing center – a cultural center – services (water, sewage, power stations and generators).
4. a playground, passengers roads, parking spaces and green areas in accordance with the in forced relevant standards of the Municipality of Baghdad and the Ministry of Housing and Construction.
5. The system of funding for this project will be supported through a bank that should be accredited by the Central Bank of Iraq to be a mediator between the beneficiary and the investor while the cost of each apartment and the payment mechanism is to be negotiated with the investing company and the mediator bank.

Investors who wish to apply for this investment opportunity can provide their technical, economic and financing plans and fill in the investment application form available on the website of the National Investment Commission and attach requirements described on page (7) of the same form.

Note: You can apply for this investment opportunity within one month from the date of publication of this announcement [i.e. 1 month from 23rd April].

The Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR) has released its 33rd Quarterly Report to the U.S. Congress.

This 158-page report is a valuable resource for all who are interested in economic development in Iraq.

Please click here to download.

A US company named as “EBM” is said to be considering investment in Thi Qar [Dhi Qar] province, according to Aswat al-Iraq.

Luay Kheirallla, the director of Thi Qar Investment Commission, said that the company visited the area to investigate investment opportunities in fields of housing and tourism.

(Source: Aswat al-Iraq)

The Director General of Iraq’s State Company for Iron and Steel has announced a deal with a Turkish company to rehabilitate its factory at the Khor al-Zubair complex, about 45km south of Basra, according to a report from Azzaman.

The plant, which was built by a french company in the early 1970s, and was once an important business in the area, has been idle since being looted following the U.S. invasion in 2003.

Abbas Jial said Iraq has agreed to pay $700 million to put the steel company back on its feet.

(Sources: Azzaman, SCIS)

ABB, the leading power and automation technology group, has won an order worth around $16 million from Mass Global Investment Company for the construction of a substation and SVC Light (static var compensator) system that will supply electricity to a new melt shop and steel rolling mill in northern Iraq. The order was received in the first quarter.

The steel manufacturing plant will have an annual melting capacity of 1,000,000 tons of billets. Its furnace capacity will be 120 tons and the plant will use scrap metal as input material. The rolling mill part of the plant will have an annual capacity of 650,000 tons of steel bars produced from billets.

ABB is responsible for the design, engineering, supply and commissioning of the project. The turnkey scope of supply includes 132- and 36-kilovolt (kV) switchgear with disconnector circuit breakers (DCBs), control and protection systems, transformers and the SVC equipment. The project is scheduled for completion by 2013.

“This solution will boost transmission capacity to serve the needs of the steel plant and enhance grid reliability in the region. The solution will also improve the quality of electricity supply and efficiency of the manufacturing process,” said Brice Koch, head of the Power Systems division.

ABB’s innovative, compact and energy-efficient DCB integrates the disconnecting function into the circuit breaker, thereby eliminating the need for separate conventional disconnectors. This reduces the footprint and minimizes maintenance requirements.

The station will also be equipped with an SVC Light reactive power compensation technology. SVC Light is part of ABB’s FACTS (flexible alternating current transmission systems) portfolio that enhances the security, capacity and flexibility of power transmission and distribution systems, and improves productivity and power quality. It’s highly dynamic response capability, makes it ideally suited for applications in the metallurgical industry where it helps mitigate electric arc furnace flicker, thereby improving efficiency.

Japan’s Toyo Engineering Corp said it has signed a General Engineering Service Agreement (GESA) to provide technical services to upstream projects to be undertaken by Iraq’s state-run South Oil Company (SOC).

“This agreement covers all oil fields and related facilities that SOC is responsible for in the south of Iraq. TOYO will, on a long term basis and according to SOC’s request, provide comprehensive technical services in order to expedite the smooth, timely and economic implementation of SOC’s upstream projects,” said the company in a statemennt.

According to a report from Reuters, Iraq sees production from its southern oilfields reaching 2.75 million barrels per day by the end of the year.

(Sources: Reuters, Toyo)