Azerbaijan, Baku, Dec.26/ Trend F.Milad
Some 131,221 tons of agricultural products worth over 113.2 million dollars were exported via the Iranian border city of Astara in the first nine months of the current Iranian calendar year which began March 20.
Azerbaijan, Russia, and Georgia were the main destinations for the exported items, the IRNA News Agency reported.
Some 61,982 tons of agricultural products were also imported to Astara from Russia and Georgia in the aforementioned period.
The Iranian Agriculture Jihad Minister Sadeq Khalilian also said on Wednesday that the country's agricultural product output will surpass 118 million tons in the current Iranian Calendar year which ends March 19, 2013.
The amount is more than the predicted number in the Fifth Five-Year Economic Development Plan (which ends March 2016), the IRNA News Agency quoted Khalilian as saying.
Iran's agricultural product exports saw a 15 per cent increase in the first eight months of Iranian Calendar year, he added.
Iran's cereal production to date has been 10 per cent more than the previous year, Khalilian said on December 19. He went on to note that Iran is registering a new record in the agriculture products output this year.
The country's oil seed output has also faced a 30 per cent increase compared to the previous year, he added.
Iran's fruit export value is expected to reach two billion dollars in the current calendar year.
Iran exported over 1.131 billion dollars' worth of agricultural products in the previous calendar year. The value of exports of agricultural products was $64.1 million more than imports in the past calendar year which ended on March 19.
Iran is the Middle East and North Africa's greatest producer of garden products, and ranks up to ninth in the world, an official with the Ministry of Agricultural Jihad said on October 22.
Iran has been ranked between eighth and ninth in the global fruit production in different years. In the production of pomegranates and pistachios, Iran ranks first, in dates and cherries third and fourth in the production of apples and walnuts, and seventh in producing citrus fruits. 50 kinds of fruits are grown in Iran. The record for pomegranate production is 100 tons in a hectare of land, 146 ton for apples and 70 tons for oranges.