Tehran, Iran, June 18
Trend:
Out of all Iran's non-oil exports amointing to $46 billion in 2018, goods worth $23.4 billion were supplied to 15 neighboring countries, Deputy Minister of Industry, Mining and Trade announced.
"Given the difficulty of international exchanges in the current year, we have been developing non-oil exports to neighboring countries,” Saeed Zarandi said at a press conference, Trend reports citing IRNA.
“The development of domestic production, mines and minerals, the use of knowledge-based companies for converting assembly to production,and improvement in trade logistics and the business environment are on the ministry's agenda for 2019,” he said.
“Of the total value of imports in 2018 worth $42 billion, about $ 35 billion accounted for the import of industrial goods, $12 billion of which included car disassembled parts,” he announced.
Referring to 25 percent growth in the textile and clothing industry in the last three months, he said that the industry managed to turn the US sanctions into an opportunity to boost itself.
Furthermore, in his words, there are plans for further development of the home appliance industry, the maritime industry and rail transport fleet . “In the mining sector, the main focus is on the exploration and activation of small mines.”
“The most important challenge is to address the currency issue caused by the sanctions, which has had the greatest impact on the import of raw materials and has led to increase in production costs," said Zarandi
He went on to say that. as studies have shown, every 100 percent increase in the exchange rate has led to 89.5 percent increase in the cost of imported goods in the manufacturing sector.
“Exchange rate changes, instability of policies, lack of liquidity and issues related to insurance, tax and customs are among producers' major concerns,” he added.