Finance Ministry: change of exchange rate positively reflected on low imports and increased domestic production

Baghdad-INA


“The change in the exchange rate has contributed to an increase in foreign reserves at the central bank,” the finance ministry said on Tuesday, adding that “it had increased the central bank's foreign reserves to 60 billion dollars.”

"We have consistently followed the signs of devaluation against the dollar over the past nine months and the indicators show that the exchange rate change contributed to the increase of foreign reserves at the Central Bank of Iraq to $60 billion in April 2021, up from $54 billion in December 2020," the ministry said in a statement received by the Iraqi News Agency (INA)
 
"The exchange rate change helped to reduce demand for foreign currency and reflected positively on lower imports and increased domestic production," it said, adding that "the indicators showed a clear improvement in business activity during the last nine months of this year 2021 in light of the crisis the spread of the virus "COVID-19" and helped to stop the desecration of the Iraqi market and its dumping of cheap goods that curb attempts to improve domestic production."
 
"It is reinvesting the revenues of the funds achieved in order to build a target production base outside the oil sector and to rely on other sectors that will contribute to the decline in demand for the dollar as a result of compensating some of the goods produced, which have made the decline in the ratio of imports to domestic consumption decline," the ministry said.
 
"Since the formation of the current government, it has adopted plans and mechanisms to work on reforming Iraq's fiscal policy and has culminated in the adoption of the Reform plan, which has charted future economic and financial policy steps to promote domestic production and reduce imports for the country, and this measure has contributed to improving the overall budget, reducing imports and moving towards encouraging domestic product and job creation," the ministry said.