TEHRAN – Head of the Iran Chamber of Commerce, Industries, Mines and Agriculture (ICCIMA) has called on the government to prioritize developing a strategy for industrial production in order to promote constructive investment in this sector, the ICCIMA portal reported.

Speaking in a meeting between the representatives of Khorasan Razavi province’s private sector and the members of the Parliament Industry and Mining Committee on Saturday, Gholam-Hossein Shafeie said: “In the current economic conditions of the country, developing an industrial production strategy should be the highest priority of the country's policymakers and decision-makers in order to prevent the wastage of resources, the exhaustion of industrial capital and the continuation of selling raw materials.”

“Currently, several indicators emphasize the intensification of challenges in the industry sector; the negative rate of investment in this sector stems from various factors, the main of which is the businessmen and investors’ lack of confidence in the country’s economic stability,” Shafeie said.

He expressed concern about the domination of despair over the country's business atmosphere and said: “Lack of transparency about the future policies of the government and the parliament in matters related to the business environment has caused businessmen to not be able to plan for the future.”

According to the official numerous uncertainties in indicators such as energy prices, raw material prices, currency fluctuations, government tax policies, bank interest, etc., practically increases the risk of any type of investment significantly.

The ICCIMA head underlined the technology gap and the challenge of providing capital for the modernization and upgrading of technological infrastructure in the industrial sector as a major factor that is negatively affecting production in this area.

Shafeie noted that the continuation of the problems and challenges that the private sector is currently facing is a result of weak policies, lack of fundamental changes, and lack of foresight.

"Many of the problems that are currently raised by businessmen and the private sector are in fact the same issues and complications which have been mentioned over and over in the past decade, and if we are looking for effective solutions to the problems, we must search for the root of the issues,” he stressed.

EF/MA