Iraq, a strategically located nation with an educated and enterprising
population and vast natural wealth, is poised to reemerge as a global
economic player and a regional political powerhouse.
As political stability deepens and normality takes hold in the great
majority of the country, Iraq's business climate has improved
dramatically. Foreign investment is surging. Strategic and financial
investors from around the world are seeking ways to invest in Iraq with
reliable, experienced, well-connected partners.
The Iraq opportunity is singular in scale and scope. Iraq possesses what
are likely to prove the largest or second largest oil reserves in the
world. (Official reserves of 115 billion barrels are based on proven
exploration. No exploration to speak of has happened in Iraq since the
early 1970s. The estimates that we find most reliable are in the range
of a total of 250 to 300 billion barrels.) Iraq is the only major oil
producer in the world with the opportunity and the intention to double
oil production over the next few years and triple it over the next
decade-to well over six million barrels a day. Tens of billions of
dollars of investment will be required to bring Iraq's oil and gas
industry to a size and standard suitable to the country's reserves.
After decades of economic mismanagement and a tumultuous post-invasion
period, the business environment in Iraq is daunting in many ways.But
the international business community has begun to discover Iraq's
potential. In our opinion investment into Iraq will soon dwarf flows to
lesser oil-and-gas economies such as Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, the UAE,
Russia or the various African oil provinces.