Policies
The Kurdistan Regional Government has developed energy policies that are based on the Iraqi constitution.
+ Our overarching policies are to:
- Use natural resources wisely to benefit all the people of the Kurdistan Region and Iraq.
- Starting from having no hydrocarbons industry in 2005, rapidly develop a modern and competitive oil and gas sector that will become a pillar of the Kurdistan Region’s economy.
- Meet our domestic needs for energy, power, and fuel.
- Increase exports, to contribute to higher revenues for Iraq and the Kurdistan Region.
- Achieve 90% localization of the oil and gas workforce by 2016.
- Put the Kurdistan Region’s natural resources wealth at the service of the people, ensuring that it contributes to social capacity and infrastructure.
+ Some of the strategies that we are using to achieve these goals are:
- Become a reliable, stable, and secure supplier of oil and gas to international markets.
- Attract experienced international companies to invest in the Kurdistan Region by offering tough but fair and highly transparent production sharing contracts.
- Work with the federal government to ensure that fair and transparent oil and gas and revenue-sharing laws for Iraq are passed as soon as possible.
- Ensure that the people of the Kurdistan Region have job opportunities in the oil and gas industry and Work with stakeholders to develop the local workforce’s skills.
- Develop downstream industries, including refining and power generation.
- Legally mandate that companies meet international petroleum industry standards of practice on the environment, and that they adhere to the Kurdistan Region’s laws to protect the environment.
- Mandate that companies make capacity-building payments to contribution to building our social capacity and infrastructure.