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The Arab Weekly (14 July 2020)

Unlike in years past, Iraqi farmer Ahmed Mohsen now walks past his local market with a smile on his face. The pale green melons he harvested are selling fast, thanks to the coronavirus pandemic.

Iraq, in a bid to prevent the spread of the deadly COVID-19 illness, shut its 32 border crossings to goods and people coming from Iran, Turkey, Syria, Jordan and Saudi Arabia in mid-March.  It made a difference.

That helped Iraq’s agriculture ministry accelerate a campaign to make Iraqi food markets self-sustainable, after they had spent years relying on foreign imports for half of their supply.

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