Economic boom
The economic boom Kurdistan region witnessed after 2003 in terms of property development, roads and urban planning have brought to the Region a lot of foreign investments, but also interdependence of political and economical interests. The legal frame of the economic life had been put in place in 2006 with the adoption of Investment law and the establishment of KRG Board of Investment (BoI).
Haider Mustafa Said : According the BoI database for 2011, there are more then 11 400 registered companies in Kurdistan. Haider Mustafa Said, Director General for Department of Studies and Information, and Acting Director General Industrial Cities in BoI, estimates at US $ 4.669 billion the total investments for 2010: "Local investors have the largest share in last year's investment reaching 79 % for 2010. International investors have a 20 % share, and the remaining 1 % comes from cooperation between international and local partners."
Mr. Haider Said says that: "In 2010 Turkish companies have been much more active than before and they are at first place among the foreign investors. Second is UK, followed by Egypt. In the banking sector, Lebanese and Kuwaiti investors are leading". Mr Said also points out some regional differences: "Turkey is more active in Erbil and Duhok, while Iran is more present in Suleymania region".
Construction is the most developed sectors in the Kurdish economy. In the capital city Erbil, it’s nearly impossible to look in any direction and to not see construction site or sign announcing a future project for new tower. According BoI, in 2010 some US$ 2.14 billion have been invested in the housing sector alone, which amounts to more than 45 % of the total investment in the year. The government is doing considerable efforts to solve the housing shortage by building thousands of new housing units and apartments throughout the Region.
François-Xavier Lovat : However, providing the necessary infrastructure and facilities often takes time. François-Xavier Lovat, a French journalist and writer who watches closely the Kurdish issues since 1960s and has lived in Federal Kurdistan in the last 15 years, is aware of the time factor in the development of the Region: “There are electricity problems? People want these problems to be solved overnight.They don't even think that, when you built a dam to get electric power, it will take between 7 to 10 years to build the dam. Then it will take another 5 to 7 years to full it up with water! So it takes 12 to 17 years before you can get electricity from your dam!”
Lovat underlines that: “It is only after 2004 that Federal Kurdistan started to get a certain amount of the national Iraqi budget from Baghdad, so a tremendous amount of work has been already done, but a lot more is still expected”.
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