BAKU, Azerbaijan, December 3. The ECO Member States have been working together to foster regional cooperation in areas such as trade, transport, tourism, energy, food and agriculture, health, banking, customs, investment, disaster reduction, judicial and law enforcement, etc, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said, speaking at a meeting of foreign ministers of the Organization for Economic Cooperation (OECD) member countries in the city of Mashhad, Razavi Khorasan province in northeastern Iran on December 3, Trend reports.
According to him, accumulated capacities for individual and regional development are huge. Member states need to firmly push for the full realization of this untapped potential.
Araghchi noted that the longest pending ECO platform for cooperation is the ECO Trade Agreement (ECOTA), which is overdue by two decades. Our traders and other stakeholders in the ECO Region certainly deserve more. They deserve to benefit from an ECO-Free Trade Area.
Iran opted for “Enhanced and Resilient ECO Region through Expansion of Intra-Regional Trade” as its motto during the 2024 ECO chairmanship with a clear understanding of the fact that trade expansion within the ECO Region can upgrade cooperation and partnerships in other areas.
The ECO trading system also needs to be supported by our financing, banking, customs, and insurance systems, whose harmonization and digitalization shall also become a dominant agenda for the ECO. The ECO Trade and Development Bank needs to be given the authority to do what it needs to become a trade promoter and a project financier and fund-raiser across the ECO Region.
Araghchi pointed out that this is particularly significant as
the "ECO Vision 2025" nears its final year and the "Vision Review
Committee" convenes in Tehran.
has done a great job and identified some priority projects that
should be given special attention and resources.
To note, the Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO) is an Eurasian political and economic intergovernmental entity established in 1985 in Tehran by the leaders of Iran, Pakistan, and Türkiye. It offers a forum to explore methods for enhancing growth and fostering trade and investment prospects.