Baku, Azerbaijan, June 3
By Umid Niayesh - Trend:
Iran’s pharmaceutical exports witnessed a growth by 71.4 percent last fiscal year, ended March 20, 2018, Akbar Barandegi, head of Food and Drug Administration (FDA), said.
Barandegi said that Iran exported $120 million worth of medicines in the 12-month period, the press office of FDA reported.
The figure includes $110 million worth of medicines and $10 million worth of raw materials for medicines, he added.
The official said that Iran’s maximum exports volume of medicines is related to the ‘high-tech’ and ‘chemotherapy’ medicines.
Russia, Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Ukraine and Azerbaijan were the main destinations of the exported medicines, Barandegi added.
Earlier, Mehdi Sadeqi Niaraki, the director general of the Foodstuff, Pharmaceutical and Toiletries Industries Office under the Ministry of Industries, Mining and Trade, said that Iran’s pharmaceutical sector’s overall exports accounted to $270 million last fiscal year, 41 percent more year-on-year.
Iran also exported $227 million worth of cosmetics and healthcare products in the 12-month period, according to Sadeqi Niaraki.
He added that Iran produced 38 billion pieces of medicines last fiscal year.
Meanwhile, the country’s Trade Promotion Organization (TPOI) data testifies that Iran’s imports of medical and laboratory equipment, as well as various medicines greatly increased during the one-year period.
Iran imported $675 million worth of medical-electrical devices used in medicine and surgery last fiscal year, 36 percent more compared to the preceding year.
The Islamic Republic also imported $1.134 billion worth of various medicines in the reporting period, 10 percent more year-on-year.
According to the TPOI, Iran’s import of laboratory equipment for sterilization and pasteurization accounted for $648 million, registering a huge rise by 195 percent year-on-year.