The collapse in oil prices had opened a huge opportunity for foreign investment in Iraq, officials and private investors said on Thursday.
Until recently, with prices above $100 a barrel, the biggest hurdle to foreign investment had been resistance by Iraqi officials, who believed they could rely on their oil revenue to drive hard bargains. This, said investors was a far greater barrier than even security when it came to making decisions on putting money into the country.
But now with prices about $50 a barrel, Iraqi officials had become far more receptive to the efforts of the World Bank and national development agencies to drum up investment and diversify the country’s economy away from oil, one UK official said.
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