Iraq's budget revenues exceed $50 billion in six months

Shafaq News/ Iraq's Ministry of Finance revealed on Tuesday that the total revenue in the federal budget for the first six months of the year surpassed 65 trillion dinars, with oil continuing to be the primary source of Iraq's public budget.

The financial tables indicated that "total revenue for the first half of the year reached 65,921,901,657,850 dinars (about 50.5 billion USD). Additionally, the total amount of loans was 15,954,981,637,865 dinars.

According to data released from January to July 2024, oil represented 89% of the revenues, with a total of 58,803,897,993 thousand dinars, while non-oil revenues were 7,118,703,763 thousand dinars.

Economic expert Mohamed Al-Hassani told Shafaq News that "without genuine and serious activation of the private sector and implementing deep structural reforms across the economy—including reducing the state's role and dominance, eliminating rentier practices, and modernizing and integrating it into the global economy—there is no immediate solution to prevent a likely economic collapse."

He added that "if spending levels continue as they are without significant changes, within a few years at most, the state will be unable to meet its expenses and will face the risk of bankruptcy and economic collapse."

In March 2021, the Prime Minister's financial advisor, Muzhar Mohammed Saleh, stated that the persistence of a rentier economy is attributed to past wars, economic sanctions, and ongoing political conflicts, which have dispersed economic resources.