Iraq to achieve wheat self-sufficiency in 2 years – official

BAGHDAD / IraqiNews.com: Iraq is expected to achieve self-sufficiency in wheat production during the next two years thanks to the government’s large subsidy to farmers and encouragement to cultivate grains, a trade ministry official said on Sunday. “The targeted self-sufficiency can be achieved also due to an increase in prices of the amounts given to the trade ministry’s supply center to attain the objective of dependence on local production,” the grains trade company director Muthanna Abduljabbar was quoted in a trade ministry press release received by IraqiNews.com news agency. “Iraq was not affected by the global crisis regarding wheat as a result of Russia’s stoppage of its exports to Iraq, which varied its origins of wheat imports like Australia, Canada and the United States, unlike Gulf states and Egypt that depend on Russian wheat as a resource,” he added. He pointed out that Iraq now has good strategic stock of wheat that would be sufficient for the coming months, away from any crisis resulting from the trade ministry’s policy of varying import origins. Iraq’s local production of wheat reached 1.8 million tons with expectations to grow to 2.5 million tons within the next couple of years while Iraq’s needs hit 4 million tons annually. AmR (P) 1