Iraq is planning to reduce civil service employment by one third, according to a report from AKnews.

Head of the Financial Committee at the House of Representatives, Haidar Edadi told the agency that 125,000 jobs will be reduced to 85,000 “due to budget deficiency for the investment projects.”

(Source: AKnews)

This morning saw the launch of a major new guide to business in Iraq: Entitled “The New Iraq: 2012 Discovering Business“, it was launched simultaneously in Dubai and at the “Iraq: Untapped Opportunities” conference in London.

Published by Allurentis, in association with UK Trade & Investment (UKTI), the guide containes a wealth of  case studies, commentary and data; it’s 140 pages of essential reading for everyone involved with the redevelopment of Iraq.

And as Dr. Sami Al-Araji, Chairman of the National Investment Commission, says in the introduction, “the sky really is the limit for investors”!

Iraq Business News is delighted to make this guide available to readers in pdf format. Please click here to download the full document (6.8MB).

The Iraqi government is to provide financial incentives for foreign companies to hire Iraqi workers, according to AKnews.

The parliamentary committee for labor and services decided to reduce taxes and other ‘not specified obligations’ towards the Iraqi government, as well as to provide facilities to these companies.

“The foreign companies can rely on their skilled workers in the technical and engineering affairs, but it is unacceptable for foreign [conpanies] to bring in foreign workers that do not require skill and can be accomplished by Iraqi workers,” Yunadim Kanna, chairman of the committee, said.

It remained unclear if that decision is backed by the majority of the parliament or by the Iraqi government, and therefore it is not clear if it will ever become law.

The unemployment rate in Iraq is 16 percent, meaning four million Iraqis are out out of work, according to the Ministry of Labour.

These figures do not reveal the extent of the problem as they do not record underemployment – where people cannot find enough work to support themselves.

According to this report, Iraq decided in May to deport foreign workers, especially Asians, but the decision has not yet been put into effect.

(Source: AKnews)

The U.S. State Department plans to deploy 16,000 civilian employees in Iraq, the Washington Post reports.

And while the U.S. military is supposed to be out of Iraq by the end of the year, the two governments are trying to negotiate an agreement for a small training force to remain.

But those forces will be dwarfed by an estimated the civilian contingent under the American ambassador — the size of an Army division — all of whom will have to be housed, fed and guarded; requirements include three police training centers, a small airline and hospitals.

For the State Department, Iraq will be its largest overseas effort since the years immediately after World War II, when it was in charge of the Marshall Plan, providing economic assistance in Europe.

In testimony before Congress this week, Deputy Secretary of State Tom Nides said the department has budgeted $6 billion for Iraq next year, considerably down on the $50 billion the military is currently spending.

Nides said the department is working hard to be ready in time, although some jobs, like housing construction, may stretch into next year.

“We’ve spent too much money and lost too many kids’ lives, not to do this thing right,” he said.

(Sources: Washington Post, UPI)

The Chairman of the Baghdad Investment Commission, Shaker A. Shabib, spoke recently with Padraig O’Hannelly for Iraq Business News, and outlined the opportunities available in Iraq’s capital:

Iraq Business News: I’d like to ask you firstly about the opportunities that are available in Baghdad; we hear a lot about the oil producing regions, but what are the main opportunities for investors in the Baghdad area?

Shakar A. Shabib: There are various opportunities for investors in Baghdad, including production of raw materials for construction, such as bricks and cement.

But also there are some areas of Baghdad where oilfields have been discovered. The area from the east to the south of Baghdad has the potential to produce about 60,000 barrels of oil per day.

There is also potential for industrial projects and factories in sectors including construction, education, health, communications, tourism, and so on.

IBN: And those factories, are they former state industries that will be privatised, or are they already in the private sector.

SS: Basically they are existing factories that can be rehabilitated, and investors can do that, but also there is another area which is allocated to companies which would like to invest in all kinds of industries, such as food, cement factories, steel factories, etc., on terms that are very attractive for investors.

IBN: We all know about electricity shortages in Iraq generally; to what extent is the electricity problem a factor in Baghdad?

SS: Baghdad has a 40% shortage of electricity, as in other cities in Iraq, but recently some projects for investment in Baghdad’s electricity have been announced, and the Ministry of Electricity will buy any production from the investors. When it comes to selling them the power, these projects are mainly under the umbrella of the Ministry of Electricity, but in the meantime companies can talk to the BIC.

Following his address to the Iraq Mining 2011 conference in London, the Chairman of Iraq’s National Investment Commission, Dr Sami al-Araji, was interviewed by Padraig O’Hannelly for Iraq Business News:

Iraq Business News: Dr al-Araji, in your speech you mentioned the visa problems that Iraqis sometimes have entering the UK; what some businesses are also saying is that they have difficulty getting expat workers into Iraq … what is your opinion on this matter?

Dr Sami al-Araji: We have unemployment – officially about 15%, unofficially I don’t know – they need to work, and it is unacceptable while we have unemployed people sitting around that we import people from the outside.

But it is fully understood, and fully understandable, that we can’t source all the talent we need from engineers in Iraq. Nobody would ask you, for example, why did you bring in this or that. In the beginning [of an investment], you put forward your action program, you say I need engineers and so on, and these I will bring with me because they aren’t available. We have a system with the Ministry of Social Affairs, where you say we need 10,000 workers, and 5,000 you will have to bring in for the following reasons, the other 5,000 we will get locally, [and say to the Ministry] “please get us the 5,000”.

And that’s exactly what we are working on. Nobody is saying “oh, no, there can be no foreign workers, or if there are foreign workers we have to sit down and [verify] this or that”, the only authority is to the Ministry of Social Affairs, and they are very positive and cooperative and they try very much to help.

But what is happening is that some of the people have mismanaged this, and that’s why there has been a problem.

IBN: Regarding foreign companies’ perception of problems like corruption, and the Transparency International index on corruption, do you have any specific targets or plans to address that problem?

SA: We know there is some corruption, but I think very honestly it is magnified by the press and by the different committees around the world. We have made a lot of progress in fighting corruption and improving transparency, that is number one.

Xinhua reports that the Philippine government has decided to partially lift the ban on the deployment of overseas Filipino workers to Afghanistan and Iraq.

Rosalinda Baldoz, Department of Labor and Employment Secretary, said the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) Governing Board, which she also chairs, has issued a resolution for the partial lifting of the ban.

The move was recommended by the Department of Foreign Affairs.

“The Board has already directed the POEA to issue an advisory for the information and guidance of all concerned on the matter,” Baldoz said.

Under the resolution, the POEA now allows those with existing contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan and those working inside American military camps and facilities to finish their contracts. Those contracts can also be extended or renewed on site.

Should the overseas Filipino workers come back to the Philippines before the contract’s expiration, they shall also be allowed to be redeployed to finish their contracts.

The POEA Governing Board, under a resolution in 2007, had suspended the processing and deployment of all workers bound for Iraq and Afghanistan because of the unstable situation in the two countries.

(Source: Xinhua)

Bangladesh expects to export manpower to Iraq by the end of this year, according to its Expatriates’ Welfare and Overseas Employment Minister, Khandkar Mosharraf Hossain.

A Bangladeshi delegation recently visited Iraq at the invitation of Iraqi labour minister.

“Within next two months, a memorandum of understanding (MOU) will be signed between Bangladesh and Iraq for fixing modalities of sending manpower from here,” the minister reportedly told reporters.

He also said the Iraqi authorities have shown keen interest in recruiting Bangladeshi manpower, especially construction workers, as presently the country is continuing its rebuilding process.

Dhaka has decided to send the workers to Iraq under government arrangements to avoid malpractices that have been creating serious problems in the overseas employment sector.

“It was actually the Iraqi authorities who proposed that we must send workers through government arrangements,” the minister said added.

Currently, all manpower export to Iraq is done by private recruiters.

(Source: BBN)