TEHRAN - Iran’s ministry of trade (MIMT) has imposed a tariff of 18% on exports of raw steel, cement and some key metals to prevent supply shortages and price rises that could cause problems for local industries.
Deputy trade minister Alireza Peymanpak said that Iran’s Market Regulation Headquarters (MRH) had decided to impose the duties following a surge in overseas shipments over the winter that had been caused by a series of international developments, including the war in Ukraine.
“Given the crisis in Ukraine and the surge in oil prices since January, we witnessed a jump of prices of export commodities … thus the MRH imposed the 18% duty on export of commodities to maintain the domestic market balance and to avoid a potential shortage,” Peymanpak was quoted as saying by the IRIB News.
The official said that the tariffs have been applied mainly to exports of raw steel, cement and some key metals.
He said the tariff may increase to comply with price hikes in the international commodities market although he insisted that some tariffs may be reduced or removed to enable Iranian traders to swap commodities with foreigners.
Iran has reported successive periods of growth in exports of metals and mining products since 2019 when the country decided to provide more support to the sector to compensate for losses suffered in crude exports because of American sanctions.
Overseas shipments have increased both in value and volume terms since February when supplies from two main metals exporters Russia and Ukraine started to decline because of a military conflict between the two neighboring countries.