Finance Committee: Kurdistan's share in Iraq's 2024 budget unchanged from last year

Shafaq News/ The Parliamentary Finance Committee confirmed Wednesday that the Kurdistan Region's share of Iraq's 2024 federal budget remains unchanged from the previous year.

Committee member Nermin Maarouf told Shafaq News Agency that the committee has started meetings to discuss and review the general budget law schedules. "These will be intensive daily meetings until the final report is completed and the budget schedules are approved," Maarouf said.

She added that the Kurdistan Region's share in the 2024 budget is the same as the 2023 budget, set at 12.67%, or approximately 20 trillion dinars (about $15 billion).

The Iraqi Parliamentary Finance Committee began its first meeting on Wednesday to discuss the 2024 budget tables before approving them.

Last Sunday, Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani disclosed the key figures of the 2024 budget.

"The 2024 budget is set at 211 trillion dinars (about 160 billion dollars), with employee salaries accounting for 62 trillion dinars. The 2023 budget totaled 199 trillion dinars, with 59 trillion dinars allocated for employee salaries." Al-Sudani explained.

Al-Sudani detailed that the 2024 budget revenues are 144,336 billion dinars, while expenditures are expected to reach 210,936 billion dinars.

In June 2023, the Iraqi Parliament greenlit the general budget covering 2023, 2024, and 2025.

The current triple budget is Iraq's largest in history, estimated at approximately $153 billion annually. The Kurdistan Region is anticipated to receive around 12.6% of the total.

Notably, the budget carries a financial deficit of roughly $48 billion annually, the nation's highest recorded deficit, prompting concerns regarding potential repercussions amid oil price fluctuations.

The budget mandates a fixed price of $70 per barrel of oil and an exchange rate of 1300 dinars per US dollar for three years.

Iraq's oil export target is set at 3.5 million bpd, including 400,000 bpd from the Kurdistan Region. However, Kurdistan's exports have been suspended since March 2023 through the Ceyhan port in Turkiye after a compensation order by the International Chamber of Commerce related to "unauthorized" oil exports by the KRG between 2014 and 2018 without Baghdad's supervision.