Azerbaijan, Baku, Jun.10 / Trend R.Zamanov
Iran imported 3,580 cars in the first two months of the current Iranian calendar year, which started March 21, the Director of Iranian Customs Administration Abbas Memarnejad said on Monday.
The value of the imported cars stood at around 93 million dollars which is 21 percent less than the same period of time previous year, the IRNA News Agency quoted Memarnejad as saying.
"South Korea, Japan, and the United Arab Emirates were the main exporters of cars to Iran," he added.
Importing luxury car like Porsche and Mercedes Benz is currently banned, Memarnejad said.
Iran imported over 44,000 cars, valued at about $1 billion, during the past Iranian calendar year, which ended on March 20, according to ISNA.
The imports showed an 11.3 percent increase over the course of a year.
According to the report, the average price of these imported cars was $24,441.
The UAE, South Korea, and Kuwait were the main sources of cars imported to Iran, with 57 percent, 27 percent, and 4 percent shares of the total number of exported cars, respectively.
The Industrial Development and Renovation Organization's chairman Gholamreza Shafei said in December 2012 that the main problem facing the Iranian car industry is not international sanctions, but rather a shortage of revolving capital.
Iranian carmakers are manufacturing at 50 percent of their nominal capacity, he said.
This is due to a shortage of capital, the Fars News Agency quoted him as saying.
Iran plans to manufacture at least three million cars by 2025 and export some one million of them, Iranian Industry, Mines, and Trade Minister Mehdi Ghazanfari said on June 16.
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