16.08.2017

Aktuelle Hinweise

Designated ministers reveal Roadmap for legislative period projects The new Minister for Industry, Mine and Trade H.E. declared, he would aim to improve productivity and competitiveness of the Iranian industrial sector, while increasing private participation and foreign investments. The GDP share of Industry, Mining and Trade should reach 42 percent in 2021-22 and it is declared goal to boost high value adding exports. H.E. the designated Minister of Economy, distinguished different fields of work for his department. Among others, he plans to urge privatization, reduce the government’s reliability on oil, improve financial services and fight corruption. Expansion of the oil loading and export facilities in the south of Iran is the focal point of the strategy of the Ministry of Petroleum, which will be headed by H.E. Bijan Namdar Zanganeh for a second consecutive period. H.E. Abbas Akhoundi, Minister for Roads and Urban Development, also was designated to serve a second term and he plans to extend the Iranian railway network to 13,000 km and the overall length of freeways to 7,500 km.

Iran planning to buy 45 Airbus Helicopters Iranian Deputy Transport Minister, H.E. Ashgar Fakhrieh Kashan, said the country is in talks with European aircraft manufacturer Airbus. The Deputy Minister said that Iran is currently planning to buy 45 medical emergency helicopters for civilian use. The negotiations of ordering mark the countries’ request of modernizing its aircraft fleet after the lifting of international sanctions.

Iran signs deal with French Air Liquide The Iranian National Petrochemical Company (NPC) and French Air Liquide have signed a petrochemical memorandum of understanding about a plant to transfer methanol into propylene, a basic chemical raw material widely used. The facility is planned to be constructed in Mahshahr in the southwest of the country. It is expected to produce 500,000 tons of propylene per year. Iran is currently aiming at expanding its petrochemical range of products and boost the generated volume, leading it to intensify its international cooperation through bringing state-of-the-art technology and know-how to the country.

Iran and Turkey aim to increase rail cargo transit The Islamic Republic of Iran and the Republic of Turkey agreed to increase the annual volume of annual rail cargo transit through their border up to 1m tons of freight, Hossein Ashouri a Member of the Board of the Islamic Republic of Iran Railway said. The only railway connection between the two countries is crossing the border in Razi in Iran’s province of West Azarbaijan. Last year, 350,000 tons of goods passed that checkpoint. According to Ashouri, the volume in the first four months of the Iranian fiscal year was already 46 percent above the volume of the period last year. Most of rail freight transit via Iran is between Turkey on the one side and Pakistan and Central Asia on the other. The transit cargo from Iran into Pakistan added up to 3,100 tons in the last four months. The role of Iran as a transit country has recently increased even more, when it was agreed to execute trade between Turkey and Qatar via the Islamic Republic. This practice reduces costs by 80 percent compared to flight transportation and minimises transportation time to less than 2 days, while sea transport used to take 11 days.

The Competition Council reforms steel pricing mechanism The new pricing method in the Iranian market for thin hot-rolled coil is based on average global prices and foreign exchange rates. The Competition Council aims to reduce the market-dominating position of the few steel suppliers in Iran, which are, since two years, protected from global competition by a 20 percent import duty on thin flats to the base price offered at the Iran Mercantile Exchange (IME). Domestic suppliers will be mandated to sell at least 25 percent of their production to the IME and have to reveal their supply schedule ahead of every quarter. The base price for hot-rolled coil on the IME will be determined by multiplying the average of Metal Bulletin’s CIS FOB Black Sea price for the last 15 day by the SANA rate, which is the daily average trade rate in the forex market.

Iran-Eurasian Economic Union trade agreement expected in 2017 The temporary free trade agreement between the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) is expected to be signed this year. The official announcement of the treaty ratification is awaited before the next EEU summit on October 11th. Currently, both parties are working on the detailed conditions for liberalizing their business sectors access and tariffs. In July, a draft agreement on preferential tariffs for 530 goods was already accepted after yearlong preparations. On 6th August the Iranian President H.E. proclaimed that “significant steps have been made in this direction, stressing that the signing of the agreement in the near future would be quite fruitful”. The EEU is an international organization, comprising of Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Russia, which aims at economical regional integration.

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