"OUR DINAR": A CAMPAIGN TO RETURN THE DOLLAR EXCHANGE TO ITS NORMAL RATES", 9 AUGUST

"Our dinar". A campaign to return the dollar exchange to its normal rates

Baghdad – NAS  

Specialists in financial affairs believe that the return of the dollar exchange to its normal rates needs to adopt the slogan “Our dinar”, calling at the same time for the concerted efforts of government institutions, the private sector and the media to support dealing with dinars exclusively, and to leave dollar transactions.

   Financial affairs expert Suha Al-Kafaei confirmed in an interview with the official newspaper “Nas”, (August 8, 2023): “The stability of exchange rates in the local market requires participatory solutions between the citizen and the trader, as the reality of transactions needs to be converted to the Iraqi dinar instead of the dollar for all transactions without exception, and this will reduce the demand for the dollar, as the trader in dinars goes to the bank to obtain the dollar for the purpose of importing at a price of 1320 dinars against the dollar, and from here the demand for the dollar can be reduced in the parallel market.”  

 The private sector has flexibility in providing solutions that help stabilize exchange rates,” al-Kafai said, noting that “integration and cooperation between the private sector and the Central Bank of Iraq are needed.”  

 She said that “the citizen is required to refrain from buying any commodity in dollars, and here he must go to buy goods from a similar trader who sells in dinars, and thus contributes to reducing the demand for the dollar, as this mechanism leads to the tendency of all traders to deal in dinars, and contributes to the non-rise in prices, as the trader will go to the bank to obtain the dollar at a price of 1320 dinars against the dollar, to cover his imports through the approved mechanism.”  

She stressed that “in this way, the two most important elements will abandon dealing in dollars, the citizen who has many and varied transactions, as the country’s population exceeded 40 million people, and merchants, who represent a large segment leading the economy, whose imports represent 95% of the local market’s need, and when transactions go to the dinar, we tend to achieve stability in exchange rates, provided that we refrain from buying any need in dollars.”  

She warned that “the importance of the Ministry of Commerce raising the slogan of dealing with the dinar, and to escalate the cases of education through seminars, conferences and the media, to be dealing with the dinar exclusively, in support of the government’s measures to stabilize the exchange rates of the dollar against the dinar and at the official rate, and there can be an active role for the Department of Private Sector Development and the Department of Import and Export in the Ministry of Commerce, from here must launch a campaign to deal with dinars exclusively.”  

“It is imperative that ministries and the media join efforts to move towards dealing in dinars and make dealing in dollars between the merchant and the bank exclusively for the purposes of financial imports,” she said, pointing out that “the commercial family realizes that dealing with the official exchange rate rates is more useful and profitable.”  

“This mechanism will reduce dealing in the parallel market, which offers the dollar at higher prices than the official rate of 1320,<> dinars to the dollar,” al-Kafaei said.  

Silwan al-Nouri, a specialist in economic affairs, stressed “the imperative that we move to deal with local dinars inside the country, adopt mechanisms agreed upon between the private sector, which offers goods and services, and the Central Bank of Iraq, and address all the challenges that prevent traders from going to the banking system to obtain dollars to cover their foreign imports.”  

 He pointed out that “Iraq has a large volume of transactions with various countries of the world, and there are challenges in dealing that need a serious pause to address them through continuous meetings that bring together the concerned parties, to create a policy of dealing that regulates the reality of the local market, and maintains its stability, and the dinar is for internal transactions, and the dollar for foreign transactions and from its official sources, and not to go to the parallel market to obtain the dollar.”