Azerbaijan, Baku, Dec.14 /Trend F.Milad/
Over 90 million tons of goods were transited via Iranian ports in the first eight months of the current Iranian calendar year which began March 20, the managing director of Iran's Ports and Maritime Organisation Seyyed Ata'ollah Sadr announced.
The figure shows a 1.5 per cent increase compared to the same period in the previous year, the ISNA News Agency reported.
Over 45 per cent of the country's total transit is taking place via ports, Sadr added.
In July, Sadr announced a plan that would provide insurance coverage for all Iranian and foreign ships entering the country's waters, Press TV reported.
"In line with providing marine insurance coverage for ships and defying the US-engineered sanctions, we accept responsibility to insure any ship that enters Iranian territorial waters," he said.
Sadr also put the current estimate of the cargo capacity loading and unloading at Iran's northern sea ports at 20 million tons, saying it would increase to 50 million tons following the fifth development plan.
The Islamic Republic's maritime official also stated that the present share of Iranian shipping in the Caspian Sea stands at 25 per cent which is set to double by the end of the Fifth Five-Year Development Plan (2015), provided that more ships are added to the country's maritime shipping lines.
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