Iraq looks to expand trade with Iran
While officials in both Baghdad and Tehran stress that they are eager to further expand trade relations between the two countries, some Iraqis fear that the government’s pro-Iran policies could be hurting local merchants.
The year 2013 registered high levels of commercial exchange between Iraq and Iran, which reached — according to both Iraqi and Iranian officials — more than $12 billion. This comes at a time when the Iraqi government aspires to increase trade between the two, with a goal of $15 billion. In a telephone conversation with Al-Monitor, adviser to the Prime Minister for Economic Affairs Abdul Hussein al-Anbaki explains that the most common goods imported from Iran to Iraq are canned food — including canned cheese and dairy products — as well as soft drinks, meats, vegetable oil, household items and electrical appliances.
The Iraqi government hopes that this trade increase will strengthen Iraq’s role in ensuring stability in the region in light of the economic and political influence of Iran. Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s media advisor, Ali Musawi, told Al-Monitor that Iraq was striving to strengthen ties with all neighboring countries, without exception. He noted that Iran has had an important weight in economic transactions with Iraq, notably since 2003, and pointed to the ease of commercial exchange between the two countries in terms of transportation and quality of goods, among other factors. Thus, according to Musawi, it is only normal for the two countries' commercial exchanges to increase.
For his part, the head of the Commerce Department in the Iranian Embassy in Baghdad, Mahmoud Bahzar, told Al-Monitor that Iran hopes to have $20 billion worth of commercial exchanges with Iraq by the end of 2017, saying, “According to our market observations, commercial exchange reached $10-13 billion by the end of November 2013.” He noted that the increase would come in the form of investments in the gas and electricity sector. Iran is currently exporting 24 billion cubic meters of gas to Iraq annually. Iraq also imports 400 megawatts of power from Iran through the Kermanshah-Diyala line, the Zihab-Khanaqin line and the Abadan-Basra line. These provinces are provided with electricity through high-voltage power lines.
The Iraqi Ministry of Trade noted that it has restrictions and mechanisms in place to monitor and restrict commercial exchange between Iraq and Iran through mobile teams in the Iraqi market and on the borders. In an interview with Al-Monitor, Undersecretary of Trade Yehya Ahmad Faraj attributed the increase in commercial exchange with Iran to “the desire of Iraqi traders to import Iranian goods, given their competitive prices and the ease of transporting goods and bringing them into Iraq.” He added that according to the ministry, the increase in commercial exchange with Iran does not affect the Iraqi market, since it is a large and open one
