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This week marks the tenth anniversary of the Iraq War and the continuation of efforts to
rebuild a country in dire need of a stable infrastructure and basic public services and
foreign countries, including Korea, are competing for a piece of the business.
Ji Myung-kil has more. In January, Sami Al Araji, the head of the postwar reconstruction
program in Iraq, visited Korea to encourage Korean companies to invest in the country
over the next ten years and said Iraq is planning to invest nearly nine-hundred billion dollars
in reconstruction projects including 45 billion dollars in its transportation infrastructure
alone.
"The oil and gas we have the industry, agriculture, telecommunication, transportation, housing
infrastructure, education, health, tourism and so on, there are lot of projects over
the next ten years to be built in Iraq."
Korea's exports to Iraq increased by 76-point-5 percent last year and there are currently
36 Korean companies in Iraq.
Hanwha Engineering & Construction won a contract to build 100-thousand residential units with
a capacity of 600-thousand in Besmaya last May.
Samsung Engineering has contracts worth 895 million U.S. dollars in oil fields and 805
million dollars in gas plants.
Hyundai Engineering has contracts worth 555 million dollars in gas turbine plants and
STX construction has contracts worth 895 million dollars for diesel generators.
The U.S. has the most construction companies doing business in Iraq at 31, while Korea
has nine.
But the Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency believes Korea can be more competitive.
"Korean companies are mostly in the fields of construction and processing plants. We
need to broaden that."
Still, while competition among foreign companies for contracts in Iraq is fierce, Korean companies
may already be in a good position to compete.
YTN reported Wednesday that the Iraqi prime minister is currently considering giving major
projects to Korean firms.
Ji Myung-kil, Arirang News.