Page 45 - IRANRptSep21

Iran’s petrochemical production up 7% in first Persian quarter says NPC
Iran’s gasoline production ‘has roughly doubled in three years’
Iran’s petrochemical production volume expanded by 7% y/y in the first quarter of the Persian calendar year (March 21-June 21), according to the National Petrochemical Company (NPC).
The three-month petrochemical output stood at 16.3mn tonnes, NPC added. Petrochemical exports are the second biggest source of FX revenue for Iran after crude oil shipments. They make up around a third of the country’s non-oil exports.
Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh lately said Iran was producing nearly 70mn tonnes of petrochemical products annually and was aiming for 100mn tonnes per year in the not-too-distant future.
With the world’s second largest gas reserves and fourth biggest oil reserves, Iran can produce plenty of cheap feedstock for petrochemical producers.
Iran’s gasoline production has roughly doubled from 59mn litres/day in the 2017/2018 Persian calendar year to between 107mn to 120mn litres/day currently, according to the managing director of the National Iranian Oil Refining and Distribution Company (NIORDC) Alireza Sadeq-Abadi, as cited by the Tehran Times on May 31.
Iran, he added, has transformed from being a country that around two years ago was still importing the strategic commodity, shipping in 17mn litres/day, to a country that exported more than $1.4bn worth of gasoline in the first seven months of the previous Iranian calendar year (March 20-October 21, 2020).
In the 2019/2020 Iranian year (ended March 19, 2020), Iran exported nearly $490mn worth of gasoline, Sadeq-Abadi was also cited as saying. The country, he pointed out, is now the biggest producer and exporter of gasoline in West Asia.
Iran’s gasoline exports go to destinations including Afghanistan, Pakistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Iraqi Kurdistan.
9.1.2 Automotive sector news
Iran’s car production up 4% y/y despite sanctions and Covid
Iran’s car output expanded in the last Persian year (ended March 20) despite targeted US sanctions and the coronavirus crisis hitting the local automotive industry. The country produced 900,714 cars, marking a 4.3% y/y gain.
The official data did not appear to include light commercial vehicles (LCVs). Tariffs on imported cars, which can run to more than 100% for luxury models, help to defend the industry. Two beneficiaries are Iran Khodro (IKCO) and SAIPA, which in the 2020/2021 Persian year were again Iran’s biggest automakers, with Pars Khodro in third place. IKCO produced 480,338 cars, enjoying growth of 21.97% y/y. SAIPA assembled 317,321 cars, suffering a 12.67% y/y decline. Pars Khodro’s output fell to 103,055 cars, down 2.84% y/y. Locally made Peugeot models traditionally dominate car assembly in Iran. Some 346,575 such cars were assembled in the Islamic Republic during the year in question. IKCO, meanwhile, turned out 55,220 own-brand Samand sedans.
As in previous years of late, the low-cost Tiba and old Pride model were the two most popular vehicles produced by SAIPA, at 236,939 and 50,413 units, respectively.
At the beginning of the calendar year, the Rouhani administration targeted the annual production of 1.3mn vehicles. The coronavirus crisis hindered attempts at achieving that threshold partly because it cramped flows of imported components.
45 IRAN Country Report September 2021 www.intellinews.com