“Expansion of trade relations among regional countries and worldwide as well as developing projects in transportation, agriculture, energy, general services, infrastructure and etc. have been among the primary agreements made by ECO members and implementing such projects demands executing regulations thoroughly and avoiding restrictive rules,” Tayyebnia said.

“ECO members, regarding their geographical adjacency, have a high capacity to improve trade ties among themselves,” he said, “via improving infrastructure in transportation sector, easing customs regulations, coordinating trade documents, and making their domestic regulations transparent.”

“If so, goods can be transported with a higher pace and their final prices would decrease,” he added.
The Iranian minister hoped that ECO could reach its pre-set goals via taking advantage of electronic data transfer, making more trade agreements in future, and imposing preferential tariffs.

The meeting focuses on easing customs cooperation among ECO members including electronic data interchange, implementation of Transportation Trust Fund Authority (TTFA) and etc.

Last year, Eco members’ trade turnover was reported $845.247 billion and Iran ranked second in terms of foreign trade among the countries.

ECO is an intergovernmental regional organization established in 1985 by Iran, Pakistan and Turkey for the purpose of promoting economic, technical and cultural cooperation among the member states.

In 1992, the organization was expanded to include seven new members, namely Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, Republic of Azerbaijan, Republic of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, Republic of Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Republic of Uzbekistan.

HJ/MA