Trade steadily grew year-over-year within the Region and federally after the fall of Saddam Hussein. Kurdistan saw an increase from $4.28 billion in trade in 2004 to $17.2 billion in 2013.
With the arrival of the terror group ISIS, however, trade plummeted in 2015, to $12.9 billion.
The numbers are now on the way up again.
“Because the war on ISIS is finished and stability has been restored to the Kurdistan Region, business exchanges in the Kurdistan Region have once again increased. For example, trade exchanges increased by 20 percent last year, compared to 2015,” Nawzad Adham, an official from the KRG ministry of trade and industry, told Rudaw.
Food, clothing, medicines, cars, and gold were the main imports.
“This means that people mostly purchase essential goods due to low income,” Adham explained.
According to the KRG’s trade ministry’s data, the Kurdistan Region spent $15.928 billion on imports in 2016 and $16.133 billion in 2017.
Kurdistan’s biggest trading partners are its neighbours – Turkey and Iran – with a collective $9.67 billion in trade. This is followed by Arab states, especially the United Arab Emirates with $2.9 billion in trade, then China with $966 million, and EU countries $469 million.
Sheikh Mustafa Sheikh Abdulrahman, head of the union of importers and exporters in the Kurdistan Region, agrees that the end of the main war with ISIS and the restoration of business ties with Iraqi provinces have boosted trade.
“The completion of the war on ISIS and reopening of roads between the Kurdistan Region and Iraqi cities have had immense impact on the growth of trade exchanges in the Kurdistan Region. And this is because many of the goods imported to the Kurdistan Region are exported to Iraqi cities,” Sheikh Abdulrahman said.
Kurdistan serves as an international gateway for Iraq as the bulk of its imports continue on to Iraqi cities.
“Due to our facilitations for traders, the Kurdistan Region has become a center for Iraq’s trade. Because of this, 30 percent of Iraq’s imports come through the Kurdistan Region’s border gates. We have noticed that 75 percent of imported goods are exported to Iraqi cities. This has become a big source of revenue for the Kurdistan Region,” Adham detailed.
“But the Iraqi government is trying to undermine these business exchanges by setting up customs checkpoints and taxing traders,” he added.
Some imports into Kurdistan also make their way to Iran.
“We have noticed that some of the items imported by Kurdistan Region’s traders are exported to Iran in different ways, especially gold, electrical and other home appliances, fabric and clothing, and other items. That is why we can say that the Kurdistan Region’s border gates have become an avenue that accounts for needs of some cities in Iran,” said the union’s Abdulrahman.
He is optimistic that Kurdistan’s international trade will develop further.
“We hope that business exchanges between the Kurdistan Region and other countries enter a new stage after a government is formed, the Iraqi government sends Kurdistan Region’s budget share, salaries of government employees are paid in full, and a budget is allocated to investment projects,” he said.
