Iran Records a Trade Surplus of $1.2bn Last Month, China largest client

Spokesman for the customs administration Rouhollah Latifi said Iran exported $3.2 billion of non-oil products between July 23 and August 22. Latifi said this is a 54 percent growth compared to the previous year, but a nine percent fall compared to the previous Persian calendar month.

Latifi further said China has been the largest client of Iran during the July 23 to August 22 period, importing over $1.5bn worth of products, equal to 45 percent of Iranian exports.

Iraq, the UAE, Turkey and Afghanistan were the other largest importers from Iran, with purchases of $346mn, $285mn, $184mn and $127mn , respectively.

The spokesman also said $2.05bn worth of products were cleared from Iranian customs administration over the one-month period, which is a 26 percent fall compared to the same period last year.

Latifi explained that the lion’s share of the imports were from the UAE, China, Turkey, Germany and Switzerland, from where Iran bought $711mn, $476mn, $281mn, $105mn and $33mn worth of imports, respectively.

Latifi also touched on goods transited through Iran in the 31-day period. He said Iran was a transit route for 974-thousand tons of foreign goods in the period, which is a 94 percent growth, year on year.