Cabinet passes oil sector reforms, seeking fiscal relief

Iraq's Cabinet has approved a package of significant oil sector reforms that appear to be animated, in large part, by the government's need to get cash into the treasury more quickly.

The new policies, announced on Aug. 18 following a Cabinet meeting, promise to change how the state prices the crude it feeds to its own refineries and what it charges industrial customers for fuel, while also creating new mechanisms enabling prepaid crude sales and private sector involvement in overland exports.