President of Iran Chamber of Commerce, Industries, Mines, and Agriculture (ICCIMA) Hossein Selahvarzi says there are major grounds for cooperation between the private sectors of Iran and Australia despite the Western sanctions on Tehran.
Selahvarzi made the remarks in a meeting in Tehran on Sunday with Australian Ambassador to Iran Lyndall Sachs.
Apart from cooperation on mining, pharmaceutical, tourism and educational areas, Iran and Australia can also cooperate on a wide range of non-sanctioned items including, wheat, animal feed, meat and livestock, Selahvarzi said.
Noting that the businesspeople from both sides particularly the Australian ones are not familiar enough with the potentials for trade cooperation, he said that his first measure is to seek the help of the Australian embassy in Tehran to further expand relations with the Australia Chamber of Commerce.
The Iran Chamber of Commerce president said that the Iranian private sector eyes exports to Australia and is also eager to develop connections with the Australian private sector to meet Iran’s different needs from the country.
The Australian ambassador, for her part, regretted that the volume of trade between Iran and Australia has reduced significantly over the past two years which she said was largely due to the imposition of Western sanctions on Tehran.
The ambassador however noted that the bilateral trade has not stopped and there are both official and non-official transactions underway in different agricultural, pharmaceutical, mining and educational areas.
She also said that part of the decline in Iran-Australia trade has been caused by what is known in Europe as over compliance with the sanctions which is mostly seen in banking transactions.