With prices of electronic products going through the roof over the past year, demand for secondhand products has ballooned in Iran.
In order to regulate the growing market for such products, Tehran IT Union is set to establish a specialized taskforce.
According to the union’s website, as demand for used electronics—computer devices, mobile handsets and more—booms in Iran, unregistered entities have started smuggling such goods into the country.
Since these entities do not pay taxes and customs duties, they can offer secondhand electronic products at lower prices and dominate the domestic market.
While at first glance, lower prices appear to be a boon for customers, in reality these unregistered businesses are ripping off consumers by selling counterfeit products.
According to the union’s PR manager, the story does not end here and market insiders are struggling with other issues as well.
“Some of these unregistered ‘importers’ sell stolen goods. This has disrupted the secondhand computer goods market,” Behzad Mobini added. “There are also avaricious dealers who repack secondhand products and sell them as brand new.”
“To regulate the market, the union will oversee the import and sale of such goods more proactively,” he added.
According to Mobini, releasing the list of registered businesses importing and selling secondhand electronics is one of the first measures the union intends to implement.
Prohibitive Prices
Following the reimposition of harsh US sanctions against Tehran, prices of all commodities, including electronics, have gone through the roof in Iran.
In the last fiscal year that ended in March 2019, the Iranian national currency lost close to 70% of its value, following which prices of imported goods soared.
On Sunday, the greenback was traded at 135,000 rials in Tehran, which would not have fetched 42,000 rials a year earlier.
With forex reserves at the cusp of depletion and Iran’s global banking ties disrupted by US sanctions, foreign trade is facing difficult times.
These conditions have unleashed outright chaos in Iran’s electronics market.
On popular Iranian online sales website, Emalls.ir, the most sought-after laptop is ASUS VivoBook that costs 114 million rials ($844), MSI GT83 TITAN is sold for 920 million rials ($6,800) while HP ZBook 15 is traded at 410 million rials ($3,037) and Microsoft Surface Book 2 is priced at 430 million rials ($3,185).
Such prohibitive prices have compelled people to opt for secondhand products, although the IT Union rightly warns that the secondhand market is full of pitfalls and is not offering much solace to the hard-pressed consumers.
