(1) The link below is for World Bank’s World Commodity Market Outlook April 2020. It was released on May 1. https://www.worldbank.org/en/research/commodity-markets (2) Its sections on energy, and oil in particular, including Box 1, pp 24-30, are very much worth reading. (3) It expects a price for oil (average of Brent, Dubai, and WTI) of $35/B for 2020 to rise to $42/B
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Summary: Iraq has implemented measures to prevent the spread of Covid-19, but confusing messages and political opportunism are hobbling an effective response. Iraq is one of the Arab countries hit hardest by the coronavirus pandemic but like others it has been accused of hiding the full scale of the problem. Last Thursday Reuters reported that the country was suffe
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Introduction Since the crash in Iraqi oil prices from US$61.0 (per barrel) at the end of January 2020 to US$20.7 by mid-April 2020, a crisis compounded by the spread of COVID-19 virus, political vacuum, failed ethno-sectarian polity, to mention but a few, the country has been grappling with quasi-existentialist questions? First, can/should Iraq as a country and
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The Gulf War ranks in terms of scale of destruction and its consequent economic impact as one of the most devastating conflicts of modern times. Both Iran and Iraq are now confronted with the need to reconstruct shattered economies. What is clear, however, is that a return to the pre-war economic situation is not a realistic option. The cost of the conflict to Iraq means that i
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The protests that started in October 2019 ushered in a new political era in Iraq. For the first time in the post-2003 process of democratic transition, a government was forced to resign due to popular pressure. The resignation of Prime Minister Adil Abdul-Mahdi’s cabinet forced the Iraqi political leadership to face contentious constitutional and procedural questions about g
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