TEHRAN,Iran, June 10
Trend:
Iran's trade ties with Iraq have been affected by the coronavirus spread, the Director General of Iran and Iraq Chamber of Commerce Hamid Hosseini told Trend.
He further spoke about the two countries trade relations, following Iraq's new policies.
"Iraq has young population that has been challenged by war in the past three decades that created problems for the country's country's infrastructure and affected the country's human capital. This led to migration of work force and now Iraq is extremely dependent on other countries," said Hosseini.
"Iran's trade relations with Iraq during the sanctions were done via a special format and relied on border transactions, border markets and local relations. Most of Iran's export goods usually being sold for three times more in Iraq," he said.
"As far as Iran's export of construction material is concerned, if the country could provide this to Iraqi consumers directly, it would've been more stable," said Hosseini.
"For example, price of one tile that is produced in Iran costs $1-2, while it is being sold for $7 to Iraqi consumers. This is a cruel approach," he said.
The official went on to add that one of the major problems that Iran is facing in Iraq is the coronavirus.
"Iraq's borders have been closed to Iran while the country trades with our rivals including China and the Emirates via Umm Qasr border," he said.
"Turkey has also been trading with Iraq via the Ibrahim Khalil border crossing, in addition to the new border that was opened a year ago to Mosul. Borders with Syria have also been opened, so our rivals were active in the Iraqi market," he said.
Hosseini added that COVID-19 affected Iraq's consumption of Iranian goods.
The situation has stabilized somewhat since then, but according to Iran, it still has a long way to go to reach the desired levels.