Questions about Iraq

[baghdad_sara]

Since many of the threads in the Iraqi forum start off with a question, i thought it would be wise (like other forums) to have a questions thread.

So, for those that have any questions, post here.

[FREKI]

How does the folks in Baghdad view the south?

How do they view Basra?


How does it go with the rail system?

[sheytanElKebir]

Originally Posted by FREKI

How does the folks in Baghdad view the south?

How do they view Basra?


How does it go with the rail system?

-south is considered backward by baghdadis, and at least until 2003, the south received very little development fund, further increasing their marginalisation.

-basra is viewed better, but still very few people from baghdad visit basra (unlike before 1979, when basra was a very popular destination for baghdadis). Whilst basra is the economic heart of Iraq and provides 80% of its wealth... most of that has gone to baghdad historically, leaving basra a wealthy but robbed and impoverished province.

-Iraq has an old rail system. The british installed 1700km of railway lines in southern/central Iraq between 1915 and 1920. In the following 90 years... the iraqis only added 400km to it. iraq has a single-track, non-electrified railway system with diesel electric locos, which cover 10 provinces out of 18 provinces in iraq. the tracks are used rather seldomly nowadays and with the absence of proper organisation of railways for cargo use... means a further reduction in capacity utilisation... however that hasn't stopped the government from throwing money at railways but with hardly any economical use case worked out...

[midotoria]

is this hotel in baghdad or erbil?

Kempinski Hotel under construction (first 5-star hotel in Iraq)
image hosted on flickr

[elusive]

it's the new Kempinski Hotel in erbil

[midotoria]

thanks elusive

[Get Smart]

i want to know have the standard of life generally speaking improved since 2003, or was it better during his time ?

[Koobideh]

Originally Posted by Get Smart

i want to know have the standard of life generally speaking improved since 2003, or was it better during his time ?

Everything has improved for the Kurdish regions in the north since 2003, but life has probably become worse in the Arab regions of Iraq because of the amount of secterian fighting that takes place there.

Kurdish regions are very politically stable and are booming

[Get Smart]

Originally Posted by Koobideh

Everything has improved for the Kurdish regions in the north since 2003, but life has probably become worse in the Arab regions of Iraq because of the amount of secterian fighting that takes place there.

Kurdish regions are very politically stable and are booming

yes thats the impression we get too, how about essential things like sanitation and electricity, was is better before? have new power generating plants been installed?

[Koobideh]

I'm not 100% sure about that. I am not Iraqi so just basing these on news and other info I read.

I think it is the same thing with the Arab-Kurdish difference. The Arab parts of Iraq because of lack of money, they get less of things like sanitation and electricity than they did before the invasion. But in the Kurdish regions, because economically it is actually improving significantly (unlike Arab regions) so more and more people are getting access to sanitation, electricity, internet, higher education, supermarkets, etc.

[kurd123]

After the 91 no fly zone in Kurdistan, Saddam cut the national electricity that was connected to Kurdistan and so, the regional government had to buy from Iran and turkey, however now the region has its own power plants and more are on the way, I've only been to Kurdistan and I don't know about the rest of Iraq, but in Kurdistan we had 16 hours of electricity and the rest came from private generators, so your not really without electricity, and like I said more power plants are planned.

[MKTJ]

Originally Posted by Koobideh

The Arab parts of Iraq because of lack of money, they get less of things like sanitation and electricity than they did before the invasion.

That is not totally true. 80% of the oil production comes from ''the Arab parts'' of Iraq, so the money exists. You can say it's the corruption.

[sheytanElKebir]

Originally Posted by Get Smart

i want to know have the standard of life generally speaking improved since 2003, or was it better during his time ?

difficult to define "standard of life". Iraqi cities were more "ordered" before 2003.

but after 2003 the following progress happened:
-income - average "salary" was about $15 before 2003, today it is $600
-telephone lines (today 18 million iraqis have phone lines... before 2003 it was 1.1m)
-before 2003 no one had access to the full internet and computer useage was very low. today.... its a completely different world.
-cars - (before 2003 there were 1M cars with an average age of 18 years, today there are 4million cars with an average age of 7 years)
-TV - the number of channels went from 2 state channels to thousands of satellite channels
-air conditioning - the number of airconditioners increased by several orders of magnitude
-trade and travel - the number of iraqis travelling abroad for holidays went from nearly zero to hundreds of thousands.
-media - before there were a couple of state newspapers and no international papers. today there are dozens of private papers and access to every international publication.
-consumer goods - with open markets iraqis have a much wider access to consumer goods than before (and with higher incomes, they can actually afford them).
-from an industrial perspective - iraq's oil refining, drilling and other industries are finally starting to be rehabilitated, ditto for power generation and distribution.
-number of international airports - before 2003 there were 2, both of which were closed. Today there are 6 open and 2 in construction with the number of flights in and out of iraq reaching over a 100 flights a day (compared to 0 before 2003)

[sheytanElKebir]

Originally Posted by MKTJ

That is not totally true. 80% of the oil production comes from ''the Arab parts'' of Iraq, so the money is existed. You can say it's the corruption.

it depends. Iyad allawi just won the most seats in Kirkuk, that makes 99% of oil production from "arab parts" of Iraq not 80%.

[kurd123]

Originally Posted by sheytanElKebir

it depends. Iyad allawi just won the most seats in Kirkuk, that makes 99% of oil production from "arab parts" of Iraq not 80%.

The most? as far as I remember it was 6 to allawi and 6 to KA so unless my maths is wrong its 50% 50%. and 40% of iraqs oil production comes from kirkuk and I find it offensive to call kirkuk an arab city.

[sheytanElKebir]

Originally Posted by kurd123

The most? as far as I remember it was 6 to allawi and 6 to KA so unless my maths is wrong its 50% 50%. and 40% of iraqs oil production comes from kirkuk and I find it offensive to call kirkuk an arab city.

about 17% of production is from kirkuk (and falling).

[kurd123]

Originally Posted by sheytanElKebir

about 17% of production is from kirkuk (and falling).

Unless Its dropped now which is highely unlikely seeing how the central government wants to use up most of the oil before article 140, you still said "99% of it comes from arab parts" which is completely untrue. again unless my maths is completely useless kurdistan produces 40,000 - 100,000 barrels and kirkuk (lets take your number 17% thats more or less 20% comming from non arab parts.

[elusive]

Originally Posted by sheytanElKebir

difficult to define "standard of life". Iraqi cities were more "ordered" before 2003.

but after 2003 the following progress happened:
-income - average "salary" was about $15 before 2003, today it is $600
-telephone lines (today 18 million iraqis have phone lines... before 2003 it was 1.1m)
-before 2003 no one had access to the full internet and computer useage was very low. today.... its a completely different world.
-cars - (before 2003 there were 1M cars with an average age of 18 years, today there are 4million cars with an average age of 7 years)
-TV - the number of channels went from 2 state channels to thousands of satellite channels
-air conditioning - the number of airconditioners increased by several orders of magnitude
-trade and travel - the number of iraqis travelling abroad for holidays went from nearly zero to hundreds of thousands.
-media - before there were a couple of state newspapers and no international papers. today there are dozens of private papers and access to every international publication.
-consumer goods - with open markets iraqis have a much wider access to consumer goods than before (and with higher incomes, they can actually afford them).
-from an industrial perspective - iraq's oil refining, drilling and other industries are finally starting to be rehabilitated, ditto for power generation and distribution.
-number of international airports - before 2003 there were 2, both of which were closed. Today there are 6 open and 2 in construction with the number of flights in and out of iraq reaching over a 100 flights a day (compared to 0 before 2003)

good summary, these effects were mainly due to the opening up of iraq's economy to the world and lack of sanctions...

[MKTJ]

Originally Posted by sheytanElKebir

it depends. Iyad allawi just won the most seats in Kirkuk, that makes 99% of oil production from "arab parts" of Iraq not 80%.

Don't forget that Allawi's party has many Turkmen personalities, so it's not 100% Arab party.

[sheytanElKebir]

Originally Posted by kurd123

Unless Its dropped now which is highely unlikely seeing how the central government wants to use up most of the oil before article 140, you still said "99% of it comes from arab parts" which is completely untrue. again unless my maths is completely useless kurdistan produces 40,000 - 100,000 barrels and kirkuk (lets take your number 17% thats more or less 20% comming from non arab parts.

KRG production is 20k barrels not 40-100k (about 0.67% of national production)
as for the 500k from kirkuk (if we take your 50/50 kurd/non kurd split) would make 8.5% "kurdish" percentage from kirkuk production and 8.5% "arab+turkmen" share of kirkuk.

using that calculation the KRG production + 50% of kirkuk production would be approx 10%-11% of Iraq's gross production.

Now kirkuk is a 80 year old "declining" field. Whereas Iraq's southern fields are all new and being ramped up now. In 7 years time when production reaches 7M barrels / day, kirkuk field would be (VERY optimistically) around 8% of national production.... 50% of which (KRGs share shall we say) is just 4%. (if KRG increases oil production from 0.02M to 0.4M, then that adds another 5%)... declining share from 11% to 9%.

KRG receives 17% of Iraq's budget, and pockets its own tolls and taxes on top (whereas other provinces send it to central budget... so KRG gets a % of import duties coming to basra, but basra doesn't get anything from tolls collected by KRG).



no offence meant in any way, just demonstrating one of the reasons why KRG is not so keen on "independence" right now.