Baghdad thinks big as oil firms sit out bid rounds

A dismal response to Iraq’s latest licensing round still hasn’t convinced the government that reform is needed if ambitious production targets are to be met

Baghdad’s embattled oil leadership may be due a reality check. Within weeks of a tepid response to the country’s latest oil and gas licensing round, senior Iraqi officials hit London in late June talking up a production capacity rate of 9 million barrels a day (b/d) – three times its present efforts and within earshot of the biggest beast in the Middle East jungle, Saudi Arabia. Thamer Ghadhban, the experienced oil adviser to prime minister Nuri al-Maliki, said a plateau production rate of 9.3m b/d was the mid-range between a high-output forecast of 13.5m b/d and a low one of 6m b/d. Progress would be phased, said Ghadhban, rising to 4.5m b/d in 2014 before doubling again by 2020. If such pl