Kazakhstan will be able to supply up to 700 thousand tons of wheat duty-free to Iran. Under the same conditions, our country can export barley in the amount of 690 thousand tons. This became possible thanks to the signing of the Free Trade Agreement with Iran by the EAEU countries. ElDala.kz reports this with reference to the 24KZ TV channel.
“Iran applies a 10% duty on wheat. And now we will import 700 thousand tons duty-free. All EAEU countries will import 3 million tons, and Kazakhstan 700 thousand tons. As soon as we exceed the volume of 700 thousand tons, a duty of 10% begins there. Iran applies a 5% duty on barley. It provides a tariff quota of 1.5 million tons, of which 690 thousand tons are for Kazakhstan,” said Zhomart Makhambetaliev, deputy director of the trade negotiations department of the QazTrade Trade Policy Development Center.
Currently, Kazakhstan supplies Iran with about 500 thousand tons of wheat and the same amount of barley. In addition, rapeseed, flax, beef, lamb and other goods are exported to Iran.
Most of Iran's imports are manufactured goods, as well as agricultural products: butter, fruits, vegetables, dates, raisins, watermelons and melons.
As noted by Andrey Slepnev, Minister of Trade of the Eurasian Economic Commission, in accordance with the signed free trade agreement, “farmers of the EAEU countries will have exclusive conditions for the supply of such fundamentally important goods as grains, corn, vegetable oils, cattle meat and lamb to the Iranian market, meat and poultry products, canned food, confectionery and a wide range of other agricultural products.”
Let us remind you that this is not the first EAEU agreement on a free trade zone. In 2016, a similar document was signed between the countries of the Union and Vietnam. According to QazTrade, Kazakhstan’s exports to Vietnam have since increased 12 times and exceeded $125 million.