ERBIL, Kurdistan Region of Iraq – Erbil’s municipality is set to begin distributing around 13,000 plots of land to public sector employees and pensioners, municipality director Karzan Abdulhadi told The New Region on Monday.

The distribution will mark the eighth wave under the Kurdistan Regional Government’s ninth cabinet, led by Prime Minister Masrour Barzani. Around 42,000 civil servants have already received land plots in the previous seven waves.

Within the Erbil province only, “around 82,000 people are set to benefit” from the land distribution project, Abdulhadi said. The total number of employees who have received the grant will rise to 55,000 by the end of the eighth stage, leaving another 27,000 government employees as the program continues.

The distribution is also underway in all other provinces of the Kurdistan Region: Sulaimani, Duhok, and Halabja.

The program dates back to a 2024 decision by Prime Minister Barzani, who directed that land plots should be allocated and distributed to public sector employees who have not received them before.

The move is particularly significant as the Kurdistan Region’s civil servants have seen their salaries delayed time and again, due to Baghdad seeking to put economic, financial, and political pressure on the Kurdistan Region.

Over one million civil servants in the Kurdistan Region rely on monthly salaries for their livelihoods.