TEHRAN- Iran exported $123 million of dates in the first seven months of the current Iranian calendar year (March 20-October 21), the Islamic Republic of Iran Customs Administration (IRICA) reported.

Iran is renowned for its dates production, as the country has a long history of cultivating and exporting this prized fruit. Iran's warm and arid climate, particularly in the southern regions, provides ideal conditions for date palm cultivation.

Date palms have been planted in Iran since ancient time.

In recent years Iran has been one of the leading countries in date production in the world.

Based on the FAO data, Iran was the third-largest producer of dates, honey, pistachios, and walnuts in the world in 2021. Iranian farmers produce 1.28 million tons of dates in the mentioned year, making the country the third-largest producer of this product in the world after Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

According to the ministry of agriculture, there are more than 400 species of date all over Iran but just a few of them have commercial value.

Generally, dates according to their level of moisture categorized into three big groups which are: Dry, Semi Dry, Wet.

Each part of Iran has a suitable climate for producing special sort of dates. Kerman province is the center for three sorts of dates.

The other main provinces that produce dates in Iran are Hormozgan, Khuzestan, Bushehr, Sistan-Baluchestan, and Fars.

As the IRICA has reported, the value of Iran’s agricultural products export increased by 28 percent in the seven-month period of this year, as compared to the same period of time in the past year.

According to the IRICA report, the country exported 3.8 million tons of agricultural products worth $2.2 billion in the first seven months of the current year, also indicating a 16 percent rise in terms of weight, year on year.

As previously announced by the IRICA, Iran exported about 3.2 million tons of agricultural products valued at $1.7 billion in the first half of the current Iranian calendar year (March 20-September 21), registering an increase of 26 percent in value year on year.

According to the Islamic Republic of Iran Customs Administration, the exports of the mentioned products also increased by 20 percent in terms of weight.

The value of Iran’s exports of agricultural and foodstuff products increased by 22.5 percent in the previous Iranian calendar year (ended on March 19), the spokesman of the International Relations and Trade Development Committee of Iran's House of Industry, Mining and Trade has said.

According to Ruhollah Latifi, Iranian producers managed to export about $6.3 billion worth of the mentioned products in the said year.

As reported, agro-food products accounted for 12.8 percent of the country’s total non-oil exports in the previous year.

Iraq was the top destination for Iran’s agro-food products in the mentioned year importing $1.986 billion worth of the said items. The Arab neighbor accounted for 31.5 percent of the total exports of food and agricultural products from Iran.

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) stood in second place, importing $751 million of the mentioned products, followed by Russia with $521.5 million.

The value of Iran’s total foreign trade including oil and technical engineering services reached $153.17.8 billion in the last Iranian calendar year.

MA