Head of Iran’s Trade Promotion Organization (TPO) Alireza Peyman-Pak has said the value of the country’s non-oil exports is expected to reach $45 billion in the current Iranian calendar year (ends on March 20), IRIB reported.
Speaking in a press conference on Sunday, Peyman-Pak pointed to the realization of the Industry, Mining, and Trade Ministry’s goal for increasing the country’s non-oil exports by $5 billion in the second half of the current Iranian calendar year (September 23, 2021-March 20, 2022) and noted that the mentioned target has been realized sooner than scheduled.
According to the official, Industry Ministry has targeted yet another $5 billion increase for the country’s non-oil exports in the next Iranian calendar year.
“We plan to increase the total value of non-oil exports to $50 billion [in the next year], however, this amount is also not proportional with the country’s export capacities and we will continue to work to increase the figure,” he said.
Peyman-Pak pointed to the increase of export incentives and the number of commercial attachés in target markets as other measures set to be taken by the Trade Promotion Organization to increase non-oil exports.
The TPO head further referred to the president’s recent visit to Russia, and said: “We have planned to increase our non-oil exports to Russia to $7.5 billion by [the Iranian calendar year] 1404 (begins in March 2025).”
Russia imports $250 billion to $300 billion of commodities annually, of which our share has always been less than $500 million, the official regretted, adding: “This year we plan to increase this figure to $750 million.”
According to Peyman-Pak, considering Russia’s imports in various areas including import of $8 billion of agricultural products, $44 billion of foodstuff, $1.5 billion of marine industry equipment in addition to other imports like tiles, ceramics, cement, petrochemicals, bags, shoes and textiles, Iran can easily realize the target of $7.5 billion of exports to Russia.
Returning export revenues increased 10-15%
Elsewhere in his remarks, Peyman-Pak pointed to the facilitation of the process of re-injecting export revenues into the country’s economic system, and noted: “In the last quarter, with the diversification of the ways for returning foreign currency and the alignment of forex and trade policies, the rate of export revenue return has increased by 15-10 percent.”
During these few months, we have tried to accelerate the growth trend of exports by facilitating the process of export revenue returns and supporting exporters, while moving towards the export of goods that have a better competitive advantage and more added value.
He noted that various measures were taken during this period to improve the trade balance and increase non-oil exports, including the special attention of senior government officials to export and trade issues through reviewing the problems of traders and solving challenges by holding various meetings with other officials and with traders.
“We tried to make decisions in coordination with the representatives of the chambers of commerce, guilds, cooperatives, unions and associations, and this process while creating empathy with exporters, also had a positive effect on the country’s foreign trade balance,” he said.
Exports to Turkey, Afghanistan on an upward trend
Touching upon the Industry Ministry and TPO’s plans for increasing exports to the neighboring countries, Peyman-Pak said: “Despite the challenges in the two markets of Afghanistan and Turkey, with the follow-up and cooperation between the government and exporters, exports have accelerated in recent months, and we hope that this upward trend will continue.”
He also referred to the TPO’s programs for diversification of export methods, saying that 620 cases of barter trade have been sent to the Central Bank of Iran (CBI).
