A steady increase in crude oil exports from Iraq 's northern Kurdish region is boosting the country's overall exports to a record 2.16 million barrels a day this month, the highest level since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003, Iraqi government and company officials said.

Exports from the semi-autonomous region resumed early February at just shy of 10,000 barrels a day and are now flowing at 75,000 barrels a day.

By the end of this month, exports from the region are expected to reach 100,000 barrels a day, and are seen increasing gradually to 200,000 barrels a day by the end of the year, according to Kurdish officials. If that level is achieved, Iraq's total oil exports would be around 2.2 million barrels a day, which is the level set by the 2011 budget.

Norway's DNO International SA (DNO.OS) said Wednesday it has boosted exports from Iraqi Kurdistan to a test level of 50,000 barrels a day from its Tawke oil field. The remaining 25,000 barrels a day should be coming from Taq Taq field, which is operated by China's Sinopec and Turkey's Genel Enerji. Taq Taq can pump as much as 50,000 barrels a day at this stage, the Kurdish officials said.

Iraq sits atop an estimated 143 billion barrels of oil, the world's third-largest proven reserves of conventional crude, but has struggled to lift output amid years of sanctions and war under Saddam Hussein, then looting, underinvestment and political gridlock after the U.S.-led invasion.

Momentum appeared to pick up earlier this year, when new Oil Minister Abdul Kareem Luabi announced production capacity hit 2.7 million barrels a day, from 2.4 million barrels a day. The record output rates have come following the conclusion in 2009 and 2010 of 12 large deals with some of the world's largest oil companies.

The increase has also come in-line with swift work at the southern Rumaila, Zubair and West Qurna Phase 1 fields, where some 300,000 barrels a day have already been added and a further 200,000 barrels a day are expected by the end of this year, officials said.

However, many obstacles remain.

The central government and the KRG are still at loggerheads over scores of deals signed by the Kurds with international companies--Baghdad says they need to be approved by the federal government, while the Kurds argue they are in line with the new constitution.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and his deputy Hussein al-Shahristani have sent conflicting signals in recent weeks, shedding little light on terms under which oil exporters will operate in the Kurdistan region.

Maliki told Agence France-Press Feb. 5 his government would respect the Kurdish deals, but at a news conference in Baghdad Feb. 17 retreated from that commitment.

"What I said was that we have agreed [with the KRG] that all produced oil [from the Kurdistan region] would be exported via Iraqi pipelines and in return for that the central government will pay back costs incurred by operating companies," Maliki said. "If there is something else related to the legality [of these deals], this is something else."

Shahristani has said there is a need for central government to review the Kurdish contracts before they are approved, even going as far as saying they need to be converted to technical service contracts, similar to what is being used by the central government for oil contracts in the south.

Although production has increased from the country's southern oil fields, its terminals on the Persian Gulf can't handle more than 1.6 million barrels a day. Officials said some 900,000 barrels a day of export capacity would be added at the end of this year, when one of four new floating terminals, being built by foreign companies, is commissioned.

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