TEHRAN – Head of Iran Chamber of Commerce, Industries, Mines and Agriculture (ICCIMA) called on the government to further facilitate the listing of private companies on the country’s stock exchange to help them attract the necessary capital for their development.

Speaking in the ninth meeting of the ICCIMA board of representatives, Gholam-Hossein Shafeie criticized the government’s performance in managing the stock market and said offering the shares of government-owned companies in the stock market and awarding them to the private sector should entail changing their management as well.

According to Shafeie just selling the shares of state-owned companies is not privatization if the management is not also handed over to the private sector.

“It will only promote more corruption in such companies,” he said.

He suggested that the government should consider putting tax on capital gains to prevent turbulence in the stock market and to limit speculation and reduce volatility.

He further called on the government for reforming the country’s banking system, saying: “Given that the country's banking system is grappling with many problems, today is an opportunity for banks to raise capital through the stock market.”

Elsewhere in his remarks, Shafeie mentioned some of the problems that the country’s production sector is faced with like the supply of raw materials for the production units, and criticized some of the regulations that have created new challenges for the mentioned sector.

“The sanctions and the problem of importing raw materials, in addition to capital and financial problems have caused many difficulties for the country's production units. In addition to the above factors, volatile forex market and high exchange rates have also increased the cost of supplying raw materials to the mentioned units so that it has become difficult for producers to continue operating.”

Also, problems regarding the allocation of foreign currency with official rates to the importers are also preventing the producers from accessing their required machinery and raw materials.

He finally called on the government to put more importance on the private sector as the main players in the country’s economic scene in the current situation and noted that neglecting the potentials of the private sector is going to make the country's economic situation worse.

EF/MA