TEHRAN – The government has proposed to allocate 15 trillion rials (about $357.14 million) for the supply of natural gas to over 8,000 villages across the country during the next Iranian calendar year 1400 (begins on March 21, 2021).

The mentioned budget will be spent on new gas supply projects in rural areas, and for the completion of semi-finished gas supply projects across the county with Sistan-Balouchestan, Hormozgan, South Khorasan, and Kerman provinces, as well as Khour and Biabanak cities, being the priorities.

Currently, over 32,000 villages across Iran are enjoying natural gas through the national network and the number is planned to reach 40,000 by the end of the next fiscal year (March 2022).

Over the past seven years, more than 290 trillion rials (nearly $7 billion) has been allocated by the government to connect over 18,000 new rural areas with over 1.6 million households to the national gas network.

In Iran, where villages account for generating 20-23 percent of the value-added in the country, the development of rural areas has been always a top agenda of the governments’ activities.

The sustainable economic, social, and cultural development of the villages is one of the major priorities of the current government, and many projects implemented and underway in this regard have led to outstanding development in the rural regions.

One of the sectors with noticeable achievements in this field is gas supplying, while the number of villages supplied with natural gas has doubled during the past seven years since the current government started its activity.

Back in November, the managing director of National Iranian Gas Company (NIGC) had announced that gas will be supplied to 40,000 villages throughout the country by the end of the next Iranian calendar year.

Hassan Montazer Torbati stated that gas supply has been developed in the cities and villages of the country since seven years ago due to the increase in gas production in the South Pars gas field (Iran shares with Qatar in the Persian Gulf).

EF/MA