Iraq’s government received almost US $80 billion from sales of its crude oil to 39 international buyers in 2011 according to the new Iraq EITI Report. This is up from $52 billion in 2010.
Total Iraqi crude oil production during 2011 amounted to 934 million barrels excluding the Kurdistan Region which was not covered by this report due to on-going disputes between the Kurdish and central government. This was up almost 10% from 2010 (860m barrels). Of this 825m barrels were exported and over 100m were consumed within the country. The three largest buyers were the Indian Oil Corporation, ExxonMobil and Sinochem.
These government revenues from oil sales, equivalent to over US$2,500 per Iraqi citizen, constitute over 95% of the total government budget for the same year.
These figures were disclosed as part of Iraq’s implementation of the EITI transparency standard, which requires full disclosure of taxes and other payments that companies pay to the government for extraction of the country’s natural resources.
Disclosing the income from the sales of Iraq's oil
All the oil production in Iraq is owned by the government. The EITI in Iraq therefore discloses the government's revenues from the sales of its crude oil.
The Government of Iraq has entered into service contracts with international oil companies to maximise production from its oil fields. The Government of Iraq has conducted four licensing rounds since 2009 and had awarded 14 licenses up to 2011. The tax structure and payments for these licensed companies are described in the report. There were no licensing rounds nor signature bonuses payments during 2011.
In 2011 for the first time, the report includes the amounts of crude oil used for internal consumption distributed to refineries, electricity generation directorates and national gas companies. Corporate taxes from extractive companies and signature bonuses from the International Oil Companies are also included. Revenues from the mining sector are not yet included.
The semi-autonomous Kurdish Regional Government (KRG) has a series of production sharing agreements directly with international companies. Due to disputes between the KRG and the central government over the legitimacy of these agreements, KRG revenues are not included.
One tenth of the world’s oil reserves
Iraq has about over 140 billion barrels of proven oil reserves and 3,158 BCM of gas reserves in 2011 (3.3% of OPEC total gas reserves), making the country the fourth-largest oil reserves in the world (9.6% of the world’s total reserves), and the country with the largest oil reserves to implement the EITI to date (Source: OPEC 2013 Annual Statistical Bulletin).
Iraq, trailing near the bottom of Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index, has been implementing the EITI standard in order to instil transparency into the management of its vast natural resource sector. Reporting for 2012 will begin soon and is likely to show that the income to government continues to grow rapidly.
Download the Iraq 2011 EITI Report
For further information about Iraq's EITI, please visit the country page on the EITI website.
