Kingdom to invest $3bn in Iraqi industries

Wealth fund creates special new unit Saudi Arabia is to invest $3 billion in industries in Iraq as part of a wider $24 billion regional funding strategy.

The Public Investment Fund, the Kingdom’s sovereign wealth fund, has created a new unit based in Riyadh to seek funding opportunities in Iraq.

The new Saudi-Iraqi Investment Company will invest in infrastructure, mining, agriculture, real estate development and financial services in Iraq, its chief executive Muteb Al-Shathri said at a meeting of the Saudi-Iraqi Coordination Council in the Kingdom on Thursday.

The new company is one of six regional investment vehicles the PIF is establishing in Iraq, Jordan, Bahrain, Sudan, Oman, and Egypt, aligning with its strategy to seek new investments in the Middle East and North Africa.

Those companies will target investments of up to $24 billion in sectors including healthcare, food and agriculture, manufacturing, and technology.

In 2022 the PIF set up the Saudi Egyptian Investment Company, which took minority stakes worth $1.3 billion in four listed Egyptian companies in August last year. Saudi Arabia has already allocated $1 billion for reconstruction projects in Iraq, and $500 million has been set aside to support trade between the two countries.

Along with the PIF investment, Saudi state energy giant Aramco will develop a gas field in Iraq that could produce more than 400 million cubic feet of gas per day, Iraqi Oil Minister Hayan Abdel-Ghani said on Thursday.

Aramco will invest in and develop the Akkas gas field in the western Iraqi Anbar province, the minister said.

There was also an initial agreement with Baghdad for Saudi Arabia to invest in the Nebras project, “one of the most promising strategic projects in the petrochemical industries in Iraq and the region,” the minister said.

The PIF is currently driving the Kingdom’s Vision 2030 and is playing a crucial role in achieving the Kingdom’s economic diversification targets.

Data released by the Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute in January showed that the PIF had maintained the sixth spot in the list of top sovereign wealth funds worldwide, with assets worth $607.42 billion.

The PIF owns 71 companies in 10 sectors, and has created more than 500,000 direct and indirect jobs. Fund governor Yasir Al-Rumayyan said last year the PIF was committed to creating 1.8 million jobs.

“It is not only the figures we are looking at, but the quality of these figures, the quality of these jobs,” he said.