[Texgreen] Iraq needs privatization to really prosper

[Roger Baker]

Wonderful news for the people of Iraq. Why didn't somebody think of  
this privatization concept sooner? -- Roger

                 *******************************************************

<http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/07/01/ 
cniraq101.xml>

"... An executive at one of the smaller Western oil companies  
operating in Iraq said: "As you would expect, most of Iraq's non-oil  
assets are outdated and in pretty bad shape. But this would give  
people who wanted to operate in Iraq an opportunity to get in." The  
source added that Iraq's nationalised cement industry could be  
particularly attractive because the country's reconstruction will  
require a building bonanza.

However, sources cautioned that the move could simply be a sop to the  
American administration. The US Congress will consider a report on  
progress in Iraq in September and a privatisation programme could be  
presented as some kind of progress in lieu of any real improvement in  
the security situation. City sources said any instruction would be  
complicated by factionalism within Iraq's fragmented government.  
Hariri, while not ethnically Kurdish, is a member of the Kurdish  
democratic party.

Experts said investor appetite for Iraqi assets was relatively  
limited and was likely to remain so until the country's security  
improved considerably. But if attempts to privatise Iraq's non-oil  
assets went hand in hand with moves to open up the country's oil  
sector to foreign investment, they would have much greater appeal.  
The long-awaited passage of the hydrocarbon law is seen as critical  
to attracting foreign investment.

Smaller, maverick oil companies have already invested in Kurdish- 
controlled areas of Iraq, but the bulk of the oil is in the south and  
no oil major would consider investing without a reliable legal regime  
and a significant improvement in security."