Iraqi News Friday AM 10-1-21
Iraqi News Friday AM 10-1-21
TLM724 Administrator BondLady’s Corner
PM Advisor: Remaining Foreign Debts On Iraq
Politics /Economy 29-09-2021 INA – BAGHDAD The financial advisor to the Prime Minister, Mudhir Muhammad Salih, revealed the volume of Iraq's remaining foreign debt, while stressing that it has decreased significantly. "Iraq's foreign debts have decreased significantly, and only less than $6 billion of the actual sovereign debt under the Paris Club Agreement (debts before 1990) remains," said Salih in a statement to the Iraqi News Agency (INA).
“Payment methods include installment payment with interest until maturity at the end of 2028, accompanied by commercial debts that were scheduled after 80% were discounted in 2006 and the remaining amount is $2.7 billion,”
He explained that “the remaining amount has been scheduled and issued in a European bond to creditors since 2006 and was called (Iraq 2028), and it carries an annual interest of about 5.8 percent, as the bond will be ended,"
“The European bond (Iraq 2028) is traded in the secondary capital markets where it is universally desirable in buying and selling as a result of its high guarantees,” he noted.
He pointed out that "the foreign debt does not exceed $13 billion, which increased during financing of the war against the terrorist gangs of Daesh after 2015, and there is a gradual payment mechanism for it, as allocations to extinguish it have been made within the annual general budget," stressing
"the allocation of more than 9 trillion dinars in 2021 budget to extinguish debt services, and this will be the case in 2022 budget,”
"Debts that have not been settled so far, date back to the era of the previous regime, and they must be settled under the Paris Club Agreement, as these debts belong to the four Gulf countries and 8 other foreign countries, as they are unclaimed pending due to their connection with the financing of the Iraq-Iran war in Iraq, back to 80s, amounting to about $41 billion,” Salih explained.
He went on saying that, “there are internal debts, estimated at about $50 billion, which are liabilities within the institutions of the government system, and all of them are between public finance, the central bank and government banks, that is, they are not obligations on individuals but rather within the government financial entity," pointing to "preparing steps to end it without affecting the integrity of serving economic development or affecting the country’s financial sustainability,”
https://ina.iq/eng/uploads/posts/2021-09/thumbs/upload_1632927507_1708974900.jpeg
https://ina.iq/eng/14418-pm-advisor-iraqs-foreign-remaining-debts.html
China's Belt And Road Plans Losing Momentum As Opposition, Debt Mount -Study
September 29, 20216:40 AM MDT Last Updated 16 hours ago
By David Stanway
Visitors walk past a wall with a map showing the species of peony in Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) countries, at horticultural exhibition Beijing Expo 2019, in Beijing, China April 29, 2019. Picture taken April 29, 2019. REUTERS/Stringer
Summary
China's Belt and Road Initiative facing some backlash
Some projects cancelled amid graft, overcharging, debt worries
China says BRI embraces consultations, shared benefits
US has launched rival infrastructure plan for poorer nations
SHANGHAI, Sept 29 (Reuters) - China's vast Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is in danger of losing momentum as opposition in targeted countries rises and debts mount, paving the way for rival schemes to squeeze Beijing out, a new study showed on Wednesday.
President Xi Jinping launched BRI in 2013, aiming to harness China's strengths in financing and infrastructure construction to "build a broad community of shared interests" throughout Asia, Africa and Latin America.
But Xi's "project of the century" is now facing major challenges and significant backlashes abroad, according to a study by AidData, a research lab at the College of William and Mary in the United States.
"A growing number of policymakers in low- and middle-income countries are mothballing high profile BRI projects because of overpricing, corruption and debt sustainability concerns," said Brad Parks, one of the study's authors. ......
Article continues at https://www.reuters.com/world/china/chinas-belt-road-plans-losing-momentum-opposition-debt-mount-study-2021-09-29/ https://burathanews.com/arabic/reports/400479
Reasons For The Decline Of Palm Wealth In Iraq
211 2021-09-28 Assad Abdullah Abd Ali ||Iraq was called the country of blackness because of the large number of palms in it, and it was at the top of the world’s list in the number of palms, and the Iraqi dates became famous and became famous Arab and international for their good taste and many types, but the case was no longer so after 1980, when the Iraqi-Iranian war broke out and giant palm orchards were bulldozed.
Located on the border to secure the arena of war!
The largest palm forest in the world within the Faw peninsula was also damaged due to the war, then the increasing salinity of the Shatt al-Arab waters came to destroy the productivity of the rest.
Then came the decade of the nineties, to hit Iraq with an economic siege that destroyed the agricultural environment, including palm trees.
Agriculture witnessed a significant and dangerous decline, with the dangers of epidemics spreading, which made the number of palm trees recede in several regions in the country.
The successive wars, the economic blockade, and then the total chaos of the entire country combined led to the number of palm trees in Iraq.
Some statistics indicate that in the late seventies Iraq had about 32 million palm trees, of which only nine million remain today, according to agricultural and environmental organizations, instead of increasing their number, their number decreased, which made many sound the alarm, warning of the extinction of dates in its first home..
· The Reasons
Four important reasons for the current decline in palm numbers can be identified:
First: palm trees have been neglected due to the high costs of palm servicing, which affects the expected profits from selling dates.
Second: The palm orchards suffer from a lack of trained manpower in the field of palm service.
Third: Not to conduct pest control operations that infect palm trees.
Fourth: The urban sprawl, which led to the disappearance of palm groves from existence, as the land is sold and its palms uprooted.
From exporting dates to importing
One of the strangest things is that Iraq has turned from a major source of dates in the world, to an importer of dates, and the post-2003 governments neglected the interest in agriculture, including palms, especially with the abundance of dollars from crude oil exports, Iraq became an importer of dates, in light of bad management of the country’s economy, so Iraq lost Previous exports brought him revenues, and he lost his local self-sufficiency in dates, the worst of which is the ugliness of that loss, which the country's politicians do not understand.
Idea For Correction
The state can establish funds for agricultural and industrial development, and in managing it, it is concerned only with this type of development, and it recovers its money from the profits of these projects,
and after the return of the capital, the ownership of the factory or agricultural land will be transferred to its workers, and these spent funds revolve after returning to the fund for further agricultural development and product manufacturing. agricultural.
With the provision of loans to farmers, support for the provision of fertilizers and water sources, and the fight against harmful insects.
Also, the authority today, that the will to restore the spirit to the wealth of palm trees, must encourage the private sector to establish date presses, cold stores, and establish industrial projects that depend on dates, such as liquid sugar and natural vinegar, in addition to date juice (molasses).
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