Clothing industry is set to leave behind the recent years’ recession resulting from inflation and fluctuations in foreign currency exchange rate, said the head of Iran’s Textile and Clothing Production and Export Union.
Plans are underway to relocate production units from Tehran to industrial towns, review the approach to granting permits to retailers and Producers Protection Organization’s pricing policy, and set up a special task force that includes all major players of the sector, Mahmoud Nabavi said.
Referring to the third edition of the ‘Iran Mode 2015: Specialist Iran Apparel Exhibition’, which will be held at Tehran International Permanent Fairground on September 4-7, Nabavi said, “This year’s exhibition has been timed to coincide with IRANTEX 2015 expo, which will definitely strengthen the links between different chains of textile industry.”
Illegal imports and smuggling are by far the biggest challenges ahead of the industry but endeavors made by the Ministry of Industries, Mining and Trade in the current year (started March 21) have raised hopes for the sector, IRNA quoted Nabavi as saying.
Clothes have always topped the list of hot commodities smuggled into Iran. Many players of the sector put the official imports of clothes at less than 10%, which has urged officials to take a strict stance against smuggling.
Preliminary steps were taken in the second half of the past Iranian year when the managing director of Textile and Clothing Department at the Ministry of Industries, Mining and Trade, Golnaz Nassrollahi, set a one-month deadline for the registration of foreign brands in Iran.
One of the latest developments is that the ministry has decided to halve the tariff on clothes from 150% (taking into account the customs duties and trading profits) to 75%.
Also the managing director of Maku Free Trade Zone announced last week that Iran is planning to embark on joint venture production of clothes with Turkey in the FTZ. “The high import tariffs on apparel have caused the market to be dominated by contraband clothing smuggled from Turkey to Iran. By establishing joint clothes manufacturing units, we can control the market and regain the revenues the government is losing due to rampant smuggling,” Mehr News Agency quoted Hossein Forouzan as saying.
