TEHRAN – The value of bank loans provided to fishery units across Iran has increased 108 percent in the first three months of the current Iranian calendar year (March 21-June 21) compared to the same period in the previous year.

As IRNA reported, Bank Keshavarzi Iran, as the only Iranian specialized financial institution in the agricultural sector, has provided 3.587 trillion rials (about $12.9 million) of facilities to 819 fishery units in the mentioned three months.

Iran Fisheries Organization (IFO) is implementing a program to provide the country’s fisheries with low-interest bank loans since subsidized input is no longer provided for them, an official with IFO said in late May.

According to Director-General of IFO’s Planning and Budget Office Rajab-Ali Qorbanzadeh, Agriculture Ministry is seriously pursuing a program for providing working capital at a rate of 10 to 12 percent for the country’s livestock, poultry, and aquaculture production units.

The IFO head has held several meetings with the representatives of the Agriculture Ministry after which primary agreements have been reached for the allocation of the mentioned resources.

Hopefully, the allocation of the mentioned facilities will begin in the next few days after Agriculture Ministry finalizes the directive in this regard, Qorbanzadeh said.

He further noted that one trillion rials (about $3.9 million) of facilities with a 14-percent interest rate will also be provided for the country’s fisheries by Bank Keshavarzi (Agriculture Bank).

Fishery production has increased noticeably in Iran in recent years and the Islamic Republic of Iran plans to further boost its annual fishery production to 714,000 tons in the current Iranian calendar year.

Enjoying high quality, Iran’s fishery products are sold easily in the export markets, and some new export destinations including China, South Korea, and the Eurasian Union nations have also welcomed these products in the past three years.

EF/