‘Annual exports of $32b of commodities, services to neighbor countries planned’

Iranian Industry, Mining and Trade Ministry has planned that the annual export of commodities and services to Iran’s 15 neighbor countries will reach $32 billion in the current Iranian calendar year (ends on March 19, 2020), IRNA quoted the senior advisor to the industry, mining and trade minister as saying on Sunday.

TEHRAN TIMES- Making the remarks in a meeting with the members of Iran’s Free Trade Zone Fraction, Sadeq Najafi mentioned supporting exports by the production units as another plan of the ministry in this year which is named the Year of Pickup in Production.
As previously announced by Saeed Zarandi, the deputy industry, mining and trade minister for planning, half of Iran’s non-oil exports was to its neighboring countries in the past Iranian calendar year.
The official said of the total $46 billion worth of non-oil exports in the past year, some $23.4 billion was to 15 neighbors, IRNA reported.
Zarandi further pointed to development of non-oil exports as one of the major seven plans of the ministry under the sanctions time and said, “Given the difficulty in international transactions, we put development of non-oil exports specially to the neighboring countries a top agenda of our work in the current year.”
In mid-April, Iranian industry, mining and trade minister said the country plans to double its exports to the neighboring countries by the Iranian calendar year of 1400 (which starts in March 2021).
Mentioning the fact that only two percent of the total imports of Iran’s neighbors comes from the Islamic country, Reza Rahmani noted that his ministry is going to focus on developing domestic production and defining new projects to manufacture all the industrial equipment needed inside the country.
The official further pointed to some of the potent areas which could be worked on in order to increase exports including home appliances, apparel industry, petrochemicals, and marine industries, basic metals such as steel, aluminum and copper as well as agriculture.
Also last week, during a meeting of Iran-Russia Joint Economic Committee in Tehran, Iranian Energy Minister Reza Ardakanian, who is also the co-chairman of this committee, said that development of economic relations with the neighboring countries is a priority for Iran under the sanctions condition.

Publish Date: Jun 25, 2019