Iran hosting forum with West African nations to boost economic cooperation

Iran on Monday kicked off a three-day forum with West African countries to boost economic and scientific cooperation with that region.

Addressing the first day of the IRANWAC gathering, Mohsen Rezaei, the Iranian vice president for economic affairs, mentioned the importance of expanding trade between Iran and Africa.

“We can establish large multinational commercial companies in cooperation with each other and increase our share of international trade; What Europeans and Americans do and are proud of,” he said.

“My suggestion is to establish a joint bank of Iran and Africa; A bank that can have bilateral accounts; It means that capital should be allocated by the countries in the opposite country so that the traders of the other parties can do business with the common currencies of the countries without depending on dollars and euros. The joint bank of Iran and Africa can be a good starting point for the development of cooperation”, the official said.

Separately, Alireza Peyman-Pak, the head of Iran’s Trade Promotion Organization (TPO), said the African continent has huge potential in the field of trade and business for Iran, which has been neglected in past years.

“In the 13th government, special attention was paid to the African region, so that Iran's exports to African countries experienced a growth of 10-15 percent and exceeded 1 billion dollars and reached 2.10 billion dollars,” he noted.

Referring to the potential of West African countries, the official said: “Most of our trade has been with East and North Africa, and trade with West African countries, which are an important place of mineral resources and high potential, has been neglected.”

Iran’s export to Africa rises 6% in 11 months on year

The value of Iran’s non-oil export to Africa rose six percent in the first 11 months of the current Iranian calendar year (March 21, 2022-February 19, 2023), as compared to the same period of time in the past year, the vice president of Iran and Africa Merchants Club Ruhollah Latifi said.

Latifi noted that Iranian traders exported over 2.379 million tons of commodities worth $1,155,532,000 to African countries in the mentioned 11-month period, IRNA reported.

According to the official, among Iran’s 55 African trade partners, the Islamic Republic exported commodities to 45 countries.

002