Pars Today

Iran has already set up trade centers in some neighbors and negotiations and planning are underway to open some centers in other regional countries.

Industry, Mining and Trade Minister Reza Rahmani has said that Iran is going to open business offices in some of the strategic countries in the region including Iraq, Syria, Turkey and Lebanon. In last March, the country established a center in Baghdad for marketing its products in the Iraqi market and also expanded the exports of its products to its neighbor.

In this regard, we have prepared for you a news report written by 'Mahnaz Abdi' under the heading: "Trade centers in regional countries to spur non-oil exports." This news report has appeared on the frontpage of the website of Iran's English language daily the 'Tehran Times'.

Re-imposition of the U.S. sanctions on Iranian economy has led the Islamic Republic to reduce its dependence on oil revenues and elevate its other sources of income instead; while increasing non-oil exports has come as the most significant approach in this regard.

To expand non-oil exports during the sanctions time, Iranian economic and trade organizations have been defining some strategies and resolved to pursue them vigorously.

The major strategy is to focus on the neighboring countries and the trade partners in the region, and it is in fact one of the top priorities of the government for defying the U.S. illegal sanctions.

Iran shares border with fifteen countries, namely the United Arab Emirates, Iraq, Turkey, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Russia, Oman, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Kuwait, Qatar, Kazakhstan, Armenia, Bahrain, and Saudi Arabia.

Based on the data published by Iran’s Trade Promotion Organization (TPO), the value of trade with the neighboring countries stood at over $36.5 billion in the past Iranian calendar year (ended on March 20, 2019); that is about 41 percent of the country’s total non-oil trade in that year.

This is while the head of Iran’s Planning and Budget Organization (PBO) says the government is seeking to double the value of non-oil exports to the neighboring countries in the next Iranian calendar year (March 2020-March 2021).

Mohammad-Baqer Nowbakht has stated “Based on the targets set, we have to bring the non-oil exports to $48 billion from the $24-billion that we currently have.”

And as announced by the officials in the Ministry of Industry, Mining and Trade, the necessary planning and investigations have been made for achieving this target.

One of the major strides to materialize this objective is opening trade centers and offices in the neighboring and regional countries.

Iran has already set up trade centers in some neighbors and negotiations and planning are underway to open some centers in other regional countries.

Industry, Mining and Trade Minister Reza Rahmani has said that Iran is going to open business offices in some of the strategic countries in the region including Iraq, Syria, Turkey and Lebanon.

In last March, the country established a center in Baghdad for marketing its products in the Iraqi market and also expanded the exports of its products to its neighbor.

The center has been set up by Iran’s Exhibition Projects Management Company to hold Iranian exhibitions in Iraq in a bid to increase Iran-Iraq bilateral trade, boost Iranian production level, and exchange information and technical knowledge between the two countries.

Also, Iran and Syria have agreed on establishment of an Iranian trade center in Damascus. Equipping the trade center is in the final stages and it will be opened soon.

Keyvan Kashefi, the Chairman of Iran-Syria Joint Trade Committee, has said “Many businesses and companies have signed up to have booths in the trade center, and now the map for the center have been prepared and we have presented it to all applicants to lease the units based on annual contracts.”

Such centers are mainly aimed at facilitating exports to the target countries, while also acting as some platforms for introduction of Iranian products in those countries, in addition to preparing some proper condition for Iranian traders and businessmen to get acquainted with the potentials of those markets.

Last week, a deputy head of the Trade Promotion Organization announced that the organization will issue permits for the country’s plastic and polymer industries' unions and associations to set up trade centers in the target countries in a bid to facilitate exports of these products to those markets.

Making the remarks in the first meeting of the Plastic Products Desk of TPO, Farhad Nouri emphasized the important role of private sector in exports of Iranian non-oil products and said his organization welcomes and investigates any suggestion for expansion of these products' exports.

During the meeting, the participants mentioned the necessity of establishing some centers in countries like Kenya, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, in addition to more supportive policies for entering the markets of neighboring countries.

Also, Iranian Electrical Power Equipment Manufacturing and Provision Company (known by its Persian acronym SATKAB) has recently announced that through establishment of some offices abroad the company is trying to lay the ground for more activity of Iranian companies in the markets of target countries and boosting the export of technical and engineering services to those markets.

Mohammad-Vali Ala'eddini, the Managing Director of the Company, says that setting up such offices in the target countries help the Iranian companies have a stable presence there to continuously identify the requirements of those markets to meet them and boost Iranian exports.

So, while the government is seriously following up the plan for establishment of trade centers overseas specially in the neighboring and regional countries, it also plans to set up some offices just for some specific products in the target markets to increase exports of those products.

ME