TEHRAN,Iran, May 12
Trend:
Iran and Iraq trade continues via Iraq's Kurdish autonomy region, despite coronavirus, Ali Shariati, member of Iran's Chamber of Commerce told Trend.
"Iraq has also been challenged by the coronavirus spread in recent months, and there were security issues as well, so most of our trade is going through the Kurdish autonomy region," he said.
"Kurdish region shares 20 to 30 percent of Iran and Iraq trade that has increased to 42 percent due to recent events. Iran exported 25 million tons of goods to Iraq in the last Iranian year (started March 21, 2019)," Shariati said.
"About 8 million tons of worth of export, valued at $3.7 million entered Iraq via the Kurdish region, that included 42 percent of total value and 30 percent of weight of Iran's export. The reason for the high value of export goods is that Iran swaps oil and gas goods via Kurdish region," he said.
The official also added that Iraq's market has strategic role in Iran's export plans, since Iran has the biggest share of export goods in trade with Iraq. It ranked the second biggest trade partner of Iraq, with 500 million tons worth of export in 2019, valued at $8.9 million. This figure is a big reason to preserve the market," he said.
The coronavirus outbreak in the Chinese city of Wuhan - which is an international transport hub - began at a fish market in late December 2019. The World Health Organization (WHO) on March 11 declared COVID-19 a pandemic. Some sources claim the coronavirus outbreak started as early as November 2019.
Iran continues to monitor the coronavirus situation in the country. The country continues to apply strict measures to contain the further spread. Reportedly, the disease was brought to Iran by a businessman from Iran's Qom city, who went on a business trip to China, despite official warnings. The man died later from the disease.
The Islamic Republic only announced its first infections and deaths from the coronavirus on Feb. 19.