Overview: Iraq’s Political and Economic Conditions
Iraq is among the Arab countries most affected by climate change. Seventy percent of the country has an arid climate (with 50–200 millimeters of annual rainfall). In contrast, the remaining parts of the country are mountainous with Mediterranean and steppe climates (with 400–1,000 millimeters and 200–400 millimeters of annual rainfall respectively). As a result, Iraq has recently been susceptible to extreme weather conditions, including drought, dust storms, and sandstorms. These conditions are expected to worsen with an increase in temperature (between 1.9 and 3.2 degrees Celsius) and a decline in annual rainfall by 9 percent in 2050, leaving Iraq with accelerating environmental degradation which would hinder its ability to advance toward sustainable development.
Economically, Iraq is an oil-rentier country that heavily relies on oil as its main source of revenue, making it vulnerable to additional economic risks as oil loses its prominence as a global commodity in the wake of transitions toward decarbonization. This reliance has contributed to Iraq’s status as one of the largest emitters of greenhouse gases regionally by emissions per GDP, with emissions growth outpacing population growth. Agriculture accounts for roughly 5 percent of the Iraqi GDP, yet is crucial for the country’s food security. However, agriculture has faced declines since the early 2000s, in part because of arable land desertification caused by climate change. Climate change is likely to increase water scarcity in Iraq, where water is urgently needed for irrigation in the agricultural sector. This, in turn, threatens the country’s food safety and security. The adoption of outdated irrigation practices has resulted in a lower level of resilience to climate-related shocks. Conflicts within Iraq’s riparian regions, combined with upstream disputes with countries like Iran, Syria, and Türkiye over water control—particularly due to the construction of large dams—have significantly reduced the flow of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. This has cut off up to 70 percent of the freshwater essential for agriculture, severely impacting Iraq’s water supply and affecting socioeconomic growth at large. A lack of competitive sectors except in the oil industry, where the private sector is concentrated, acts as a hurdle to the country’s transition to a diversified economy. The public sector’s persistent dominance over the Iraqi formal economy, along with a history of political tensions and conflict, leaves no room for other than a weak and predominantly informal private sector and a feeble business environment.
Iraq has a population of roughly 47 million people and comprises a majority of Arabs with a significant Kurdish population in the country’s northeastern part. Despite the country’s richness in oil resources, around 78 percent of the population has living standards that range from low to average. Human capital in Iraq is already low, with only 13 percent of women in the labor force. Climate change in Iraq will have socioeconomic repercussions on all economic sectors, with a particular impact on the demand for unskilled labor, in addition to its toll on poor and vulnerable groups. Iraq is also subject to overpopulation; with an anticipated yearly population growth of 1 million, the country is expected to reach 80 million by 2050, putting it at high socio-environmental risk. The growing Iraqi population comes at the expense of agricultural lands as urban areas expand to accommodate this growth, leaving the agriculture sector unable to provide for the population and leading to an inevitable food crisis.
Politically, Iraq is relatively stable after decades of armed conflicts that followed the 2003 U.S. invasion. However, the country is still subject to the deep division and unresolved grievances that ignited the 2019 protests. The reasons for this include failure of public services, resentment of the current political system, a deteriorated infrastructure, and rampant corruption. The country’s long history of conflict and instability has taken its toll on leadership and management capacities. Oil and gas management is a main driver for disputes between the Kurdistan Regional Government and the Iraqi government. At the same time, climate change further threatens Iraq’s already fragile social contract—undermined by clientelism, corruption, and limited accountability—by deepening existing inequalities and increasing the risk of civil unrest and state fragility, particularly in the absence of responsive and effective governance.
Iraq’s Climate Mitigation and Adaptation Strategy
Iraq’s climate strategy is directed by its Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) and its National Strategy for the Protection and Improvement of the Environment (NSPIE). The strategy streamlines core objectives and programs for Iraq’s climate-sensitive sectors for the years 2024–2030, helping create a foundation for the implementation of its NDC. Both documents focus on enhancing institutional, technological, human, and financial capacities to advance climate mitigation and adaptation goals through the following mechanisms:
- Improving institutional development and integrating and localizing governance across relevant sectors
- Modernizing resource management to strengthen resilience to climate challenges
- Engaging the private sector and higher education institutions in adaptation
- Creating a green, resource-diverse economy to mitigate climate-induced socioeconomic vulnerabilities
Iraq’s NDC outlines concrete goals that support its vision for a decarbonized economy by focusing its mitigation efforts on energy—including oil, gas, electricity, and transport, which are the country’s highest-emitting and most lucrative sectors, with oil accounting for 85% of the Iraqi government’s budget revenue. Iraq has targeted a 15 percent reduction from business-as-usual emissions, conditional on receiving $100 billion in international donations, along with an unconditional reduction target of 1–2 percent by 2035. The NDC also issued a specific target for the electricity sector to reach 12 gigawatts of renewable energy capacity by 2030 through the increased use of solar, wind, and hydro energy; the issuance of green and smart building codes; and the commissioning of low-carbon-polluting technologies in the energy and transportation sectors.
The country’s NSPIE also maps out indicators to monitor the completion of targets set for 2025, 2027, and 2030 and calls for the creation of standardized databases on the impacts of air pollutants on health and natural hazard occurrences. Water resources, agriculture, waste, and housing are also identified as key sectors with opportunities for efficient clean energy systems that could strengthen the country’s economic resilience and human capacity. Decentralizing water supplies and sanitation solutions at the local governorate level, innovating sustainable agricultural technology to improve food security, and localizing product use are a few examples of Iraq’s goals to achieve inclusive economic growth through a green transition.
In terms of adaptation, the state is framing its strategy according to two priorities: First, developing sustainable infrastructure to combat climate change, and second, strengthening institutional management and capacities. Iraq’s main approach involves adopting sustainable management plans, targeted regulations, legislation, and quality checks—such as those for water and air quality during industrial processes and farming activities. To facilitate these actions, the state has implemented R&D, training, and environmental education programs as a part of its wider capacity-building efforts to combat climate change.
Given the Iraqi government’s priorities as outlined in its national climate strategies, this database focuses on the following three ministries: the Ministry of Environment, the Ministry of Water Resources, and the Ministry of Agriculture. Importantly, the Ministry of Oil, the Ministry of Electricity and the Ministry of Transport do not have their laws published under their website domains and thus were not included in the database analysis. This underlines the country’s need for greater institutional capacity; publicly available regulations are necessary for coordinating effective strategies across sectors and levels of government. This lack of transparency also creates obstacles for non-state actors—including civil society groups, the private sector, and development organizations—seeking to contribute to climate efforts.
Budgeting for Change: Assessing Iraq’s Financial Commitment to Building Climate Resilience
This budgetary assessment acknowledges Iraq’s commitment to diversifying its economy, which is essential to address climate change, in the wake of its recovery from overspending on post-war reconstruction. However, budget allocations to the relevant government institutions— the Ministry of Environment, the Ministry of Agriculture, the Ministry of Water Resources, the Ministry of Transport, the Ministry of Electricity, and the Ministry of Oil—have continued to oscillate. Despite a decline in their share of total financial allocations, two ministries still receive the highest financial capacity: the Ministry of Electricity and the Ministry of Oil. This leaves the other ministries with inadequate public financing, particularly the Ministries of Agriculture and Water Resources, as well as the Ministry of Environment, which play a significant role in climate change mitigation. For instance, the Ministry of Electricity’s share of the total national budget in 2016 was at 3.8 percent, which skyrocketed to 21.7 percent in 2020 and then declined to 10.74 percent in 2024. While the Ministry of Oil consistently received one of the highest allocations—reflecting the sector’s central role as the country’s main source of revenue—its share dropped from 21 percent in 2017 to 14.79 percent in 2024. The budget allocated to the Ministry of Agriculture was less than 2 percent from 2016 to 2024, and the least allocation went to the Ministry of Water Resources: 0.4 percent in 2016, 1.08 percent in 2020, and 0.75 percent in 2024. These small budgets act as a barrier for executives in carrying out the implementation of strategic projects and could explain the suspension of water projects and infrastructure, in addition to the 40 percent damage inflicted on the agriculture sector, which was followed by a 67 percent decline in productivity for agriculture and non-agriculture businesses.
There was also a decline in the financial allocation share of the Ministry of Environment from 2016 to 2024. The ministry enjoyed 6.3 percent in 2016, which was then drastically reduced to 0.08 percent in 2024. Although there has also been a decline in the financial share of the Ministry of Oil that could suggest the country is working to reduce its reliance on oil, this decrease is still insufficient for economic diversification. To bolster diversification, Iraq could promote the role of the private sector in subsidizing renewable energy and innovative technologies. This would be crucial in helping the country cut the use of methane gas, which would not only contribute to climate change mitigation but could also save Iraq $600 million that other economic sectors—such as agriculture and water resources—could benefit from to work toward food and water security.
Database Analysis: Evaluating Iraq’s Climate Governance Framework
Iraq’s institutional tools—ministerial laws, instructions, acts, and internal regulations—evaluated in our database showcase organizational mandates and functions, policy planning, implementation processes, and mechanisms for stakeholder engagement mainly led by the Ministry of Environment, the Ministry of Water Resources, and the Ministry of Agriculture. These procedures and standards specifically address conducting environmental impact and assessment studies, mitigating harmful practices in high-emitting sectors, managing water and energy resources efficiently, financing climate strategies, building public awareness and knowledge, and integrating institutional capacities. Governance assessments are based on the following criteria: political processes (transparency, accountability, and representation); capacity of actors (human capacity, financial capacity, and oversight); and institutional mandates (management and goals).
We determined that eighteen out of twenty institutional tools assessed in the database were sufficiently transparent and accountable to meet our political processes criterion, which means the stakeholders involved and the method of the policy’s design, development, or execution are clearly stated in a law, act, regulation or instruction. Law No. 37 of 2008 and Law No. 50 of 2008, and instruction for Law No. 3 of 2015, outline clear frameworks for sustainable management and implementation in line with international best practices in the water and waste sectors and in relation to mitigating pollution in high-emitting sectors. Transparency in governance can largely be credited to institutional structures that streamline management responsibilities and, equally importantly, invest in human capacity to strengthen these oversight functions.
Ninety percent of the institutional tools we assessed showed enough oversight to satisfy our capacity criterion. Iraq’s Ministry of Environment, for instance, created an “environmental police” unit under Law No. 27 of 2009. The police are tasked with monitoring environmental pollutants in case of environmental or natural disasters, and with carrying out the judicial and administrative judgments and decisions issued by the ministry.
Iraq’s Ministry of Agriculture has made efforts to foster technical knowledge as a pathway for improved oversight and enforcement in policy implementation. To fulfill Law No. 10 of 2013’s mandate to develop more sustainable agricultural ecosystems, the ministry is tasked with partnering with scientists from local and foreign universities to prepare for introducing modern agricultural techniques that will help Iraq improve food security and reach self-sufficiency. Iraq has especially promoted human capacity—by calling for and starting to implement environmental awareness programs in schools, workshops, seminars, and conferences for policymakers—with respect to mitigation and achieving emissions reductions and limitations targets. Despite these agricultural policies’ attention toward mitigation and adaptation, none of the laws specifically relate adaptation and resilience-building actions to climate risks and vulnerability, aside from one that aims to improve the Ministry’s organizational capacities to reach food security. Excluding climate risk and vulnerability from policymaking language detracts from the country’s responsibilities in meeting its national climate goals.
While adaptation is only targeted in 60 percent of Iraq’s regulatory framework, the country has taken steps to compartmentalize oversight based on sectoral expertise; multi-sectoral and cross-level government representation is a key ingredient to building efficient and long-term adaptive capacities both nationally and locally. For instance, the issue of Iraq’s water resources being polluted by industrial activities that consequently threaten sustainable agricultural production and food security requires an integrated governance approach among the water, industrial, and agricultural sectors, as outlined in Law No. 27 of 2009.
Integration also suggests localized and regionalized governance, which Iraq’s regulatory framework addresses. Iraq’s policies designate oversight and management duties to municipal authorities in the waste sector and the energy and industrial sectors to vet instances of hazardous contamination and emissions violations. However, while nineteen out of twenty of the institutional mandates in Iraq’s database meets our “representation” criterion, only one mandate in the database (establishing the Ministry of Water Resources) explicitly states plans to involve civil society and nongovernmental organizations in the policymaking process.
Beyond multi-stakeholder policymaking and oversight, climate-resilient infrastructure and long-term disaster risk reduction strategies are principal components of our measure of adaptive capacity that are meagerly mentioned in Iraq’s policy framework. For example, Iraq’s NSPIE reveals plans to implement a disaster risk reduction strategy, but the country has not yet issued this plan, and there is no existing institutional framework in support of disaster management. The same can be said for Iraq’s transportation sector, which is considered a key pathway to emissions reduction according to the NDC and NSPIE, but not treated as such by current governance structures. Adaptation is a priority for Iraq; nevertheless, misalignments between ministerial laws, regulations, and national strategies remain obstacles to organizational capacity and thus to short- and long-term adaptation.
None of Iraq’s institutional mandates prescribe specific timelines—long-term or short-term—for proposed plans (we considered “long-term” to be targets set to be achieved by 2050–2060 and “short-term” to be targets set to be achieved by 2030). Absent timelines inherently weaken pathways for accountability. With only half of the regulations from the database presenting sound accountability measures, Iraq could significantly benefit from designing clear and transparent accountability practices for all stages of the policy and project implementation process. Iraq’s accountability strategies emphasize prevention mechanisms, such as mandating the reporting of emissions violations and the environmental, resource, and health impacts of industrial agriculture and waste management activities, along with subsequent institutional assessments and evaluations.
However, these mechanisms, intended to disincentivize breaches, are not supported by corrective actions when shortcomings do occur. For instance, ministerial requests for follow-up reports on potential plans to mitigate harmful impacts after violations—outlined in Law No. 27 of 2009—and suggestions for implementing expert recommendations to improve resource management—outlined in Law No. 2 of 2014—are not accompanied by systems for ongoing supervision to ensure future compliance. These systems are crucial in enabling economic and social resilience to climate change through effective policy implementation. Similarly, Iraq could strengthen enforcement by introducing robust financial incentives—such as tax tariffs, subsidies, grants, or investments—which, beyond the approval of loans to farmers for agricultural development under Law No. 28 of 2009, are notably absent in the current climate governance framework
Conclusion
Iraq faces a multifaceted set of challenges exacerbated by climate change, which threaten both its environmental and its socio-economic stability. The country’s over-reliance on oil as its main economic driver, compounded by climate-induced vulnerabilities such as water scarcity and land desertification, places Iraq at a critical juncture. Despite efforts in climate mitigation and adaptation through national strategies like the NDC and the NSPIE, Iraq’s financial commitment remains insufficient to effectively address these challenges, with key ministries such as those for agriculture, water resources, and environment receiving inadequate funding. Iraq’s multi-sectoral approach to governance, particularly in integrating water, industry, and agriculture sectors, is a step toward more coordinated and holistic climate action. The regulation of industrial practices to mitigate pollution, as outlined in various laws and instructions, also points to Iraq’s proactive stance in aligning with international best practices in environmental governance. However, the country’s institutional frameworks, while commendable in some areas, still lack the transparency, accountability, and comprehensive disaster management mechanisms required for long-term resilience. For Iraq to navigate the complexities of climate change and achieve its sustainable development targets, it will need to prioritize enhanced institutional capacity, financial investment in climate resilience, and a concerted effort to diversify its economy beyond oil.
Acknowledgments
The authors extend sincere thanks to Khaled Suleiman for invaluable assistance in co-producing the Iraq budget database.
