TEHRAN- The head of Isfahan Province’s Industry, Mining, and Trade Department said that 70 mining licenses have been issued in the province for exploration and mining operation since the beginning of the current Iranian calendar year (March 20).

Iraj Movafaq said that of the mentioned figure, 50 licenses were for the exploration operation, and 20 licenses were for the mining operations.

He said the mentioned operations provide jobs for 131 persons.

In early June, Deputy Industry, Mining, and Trade Minister Darioush Esmaili had said that the country’s Mining Investment Insurance Corporation (MIIC) was going to allocate 30 trillion rials (over $714.2 million) for supporting mining exploration projects.

He said that the ministry has it on the agenda to increase the country’s discovered mineral reserves by 25 percent in the current Iranian calendar year (ends on March 20, 2021).

In late April, the official had said that the Industry, Mining, and Trade Ministry has provisioned operational targets in the mining sector’s three major areas of exploration, extraction, and processing, for the current year.

“In the mining industry sector, we have targeted a 25-percent increase in the production of mineral products, and in the exploration sector, we will add about 20 percent to the previous reserves.”

The mining sector accounted for 25 percent of the country’s non-oil revenues in the past Iranian calendar year, he said.

In the past few years with new resilient economy strategies coming into play, the mining sector has become a major point of focus for the Iranian government and various organizations and bodies active in this sector have been tasked to implement new programs for boosting this sector.

As a major state-owned holding company active in the mining sector in the country, Iranian Mines and Mining Industries Development and Renovation Organization (IMIDRO) has been playing a significant part in the mentioned planning.

The organization has been implementing several new programs in all the main fields of the mining industry including exploration, machinery development, extraction and also reviving the country’s idle mines.

According to the IMIDRO Head Khodadad Gharibpour, IMIDRO has put the development of mines and mining industries on the agenda with three main strategies: increasing exploration operations, developing infrastructure, and reviving the country’s idle small-scale mines.

According to the official, following these major axes, the organization so far has managed to expand the country’s mining exploration operations up to 650,000 square kilometers, while increasing the budget for the development of the mining infrastructure in 31 provinces.

MA/MA