Vehicle import tariffs will remain unchanged in the next fiscal year (starting March 21), a deputy minister of industries, mining and trade said.
“The tariff of vehicles that are to be imported in the fiscal 2022-23 will not change and is based on the same previous tariffs,” Mohsen Salehinia was also quoted as saying by the news portal of Car.ir.
“In the past, when cars were imported, the customs tariff started from 40% and rose up to 75% based on the capacity of car engines. Next year, car import tariffs are expected to remain the same,” he added.
The official noted that companies or individuals allowed by the government to import cars will be subjected to technical regulations pertaining to car imports, as the government is not undertaking car imports.
“Usually, companies that intend to import cars must have the prerequisites of providing sales and after-sales services, as well as supplying the parts needed. Therefore, companies that can meet these criteria will be allowed to import cars that are allowed,” he said.
Asked whether domestic automakers would be allowed to import, he said, “Earlier, some domestic automakers in the private sector and the two major automakers allowed to import a limited number of cars. Therefore, in the current situation, if they can also meet the above-mentioned criteria and seek to import, they can import passenger cars.”
Salehinia also said the value of imports in previous years averaged about $20,000-22,000 per car, meaning about $1.4 million would be spent on car imports next year.
“There has never been a restriction on car imports to support domestic production. In recent years, we faced difficulties due to international restrictions on foreign exchange for the import of essential goods or other products,” he added.
Majlis Joint Commission Approves Proposal to Import 70,000 Cars
The number of imported cars, which has been discussed intermittently by the Majlis Joint Commission as part of the fiscal 2022-23 budget bill, has been ratcheted up to 70,000.
This issue has now been referred to the parliament for the final ratification.
According to the latest resolution of this commission, the proposal to import 70,000 cars, which was announced two weeks ago, has been approved and added to the budget bill, the news portal of Car.ir reported.
The issue of importing 50,000 passenger cars, which had been initially pitched in the fiscal 2022-23 budget bill and approved by the Majlis Joint Commission during the bill’s review, has been reexamined.
"Last night, there was a discussion about this issue and the numbers related to it were corrected,” Jafar Qaderi, a member of the commission, told Tasnim News Agency.
Qaderi noted that although the commission had previously discussed the elimination of passenger car imports from the budget bill, a number of deputies believed that the parliament should take up this issue.
“Some lawmakers believed that we should not get involved in the issue again because the Expediency Council has not yet taken up the Majlis plan to import cars. Therefore, there were disagreements in this regard, but in the end, the proposal received a positive vote from the commission,” he added.
The Expediency Council arbitrates on issues disputed by the government, the parliament or the Guardians Council, so how it could intervene over an issue that has not even been voted for or against by the parliament is unclear.
Mohammad Reza Mirtajeddini, chairman of the Targeted Subsidies Committee of the commission, commented on the imported items in the supplementary Note 7 and said, “Imported items will include 50,000 passenger cars and 20,000 hybrid and electric cars, 10,000 trucks, trailers, refrigerated trucks and vehicle pullers, as well as 10,000 suburban and inner-city buses.”
Mirtajeddini noted that the import of 1,000 ordinary and refrigerated wagons, as well as 5,000 heavy road construction machinery that are a maximum of five years old, has also been approved.
Import of 50,000 Cars Unlikely
After the Majlis Joint Commission initially approved the import of 50,000 passenger cars in the next fiscal year (starting March 21), some experts doubted the feasibility of this legislation.
"Even if the cars are imported and all restrictions are removed, it is still not possible to reach this figure," an automotive expert opined.
“Even if the same 50,000 passenger cars are imported, the government will not earn 600 trillion rials,” Farbod Zaveh was also quoted as saying by Donya-e-Khodro.
"Previously, the commission had assigned 12 billion rials for each car, which showed that 50,000 Porsches must be imported to achieve such an income. But this was not possible and perhaps for the same reason, they changed the type of imported cars from passenger vehicles to commercial vehicles,” he added.
Zaveh noted that it is not possible to import 50,000 cars, so we can only count on the annual import of 5,000 commercial vehicles.
The expert also said that it seems unlikely that the funding will be provided.
“The same 5,000 commercial vehicles also need close to €500 million in funding, which is a considerable figure … The Iranian economy is very small and this figure is very large. It is unlikely that we will be able to import 5,000 units a year," he added.
