TEHRAN – Iran has appointed five new commercial attachés to be dispatched to the country’s major trading partners in the near future, the head of the country’s Trade Promotion Organization (TPO) announced.

“Currently, the commercial attachés for China, Armenia, Oman, Azerbaijan, and Russia have been appointed and will be sent to the mentioned countries soon,” the TPO portal quoted Hamid Zadboum as saying.

The official also announced plans for dispatching commercial attachés to Turkey, Pakistan, and India in the current Iranian calendar year (started on March 21).

Referring to the significant role of commercial attachés in the target markets, Zadboum said: “The significance of the activities of commercial attachés for the private sector is so that the private sector considers them as their supporters and companions in target countries.”

The private sector believes that the presence of commercial attachés in the target countries will reduce their export costs significantly and they can use the attachés’ expertise and guidance to increase exports and remove existing barriers and problems, he added.

Back in February, Mojtaba Mousavian, the TPO’s deputy head for export markets development had said that the number of Iranian commercial attachés will reach 10 in the first half of the current Iranian calendar year (March 21-September 22).

He noted that some markets like the neighboring countries plus China and India are the top priorities for dispatching commercial attachés.

Syria, Kazakhstan, and Lebanon are also the next countries to which TPO plans to send commercial attachés, the official said.

According to Mousavian, TPO has sent 69 commercial attachés to various countries over the past 25 years, and at best, even in one year, 25 commercial attachés were present at their mission.

The number, however, has now decreased, he said adding: “Considering the needs of the country’s business community and the private sector and in order to develop and facilitate non-oil trade, the organization has been implementing new programs for increasing the number of commercial attachés, at least in the country’s top trade partners.”

Following the government’s policies for increasing the country’s trade with the neighbors over the past few years, the TPO, as the foreign trade representative of the Industry, Mining, and Trade Ministry, has been trying to send new commercial attachés to target markets every year.

In early December 2020, the Head of Iran Chamber of Commerce, Industries, Mines and Agriculture (ICCIMA) Gholam-Hossein Shafeie had called on the government to choose the country’s commercial attachés from among the private sector representatives.

EF/MA