Iran’s customs office IRICA says Russia was responsible for a bulk of trade between Iran and members of the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) in the year to March 20.
IRICA chief Mehdi Mir Ashrafi said on Wednesday that Iran’s trade with Russia had amounted to nearly $2.626 billion in value terms over the past calendar year.
Mir Ashrafi said, however, that Iran had posted a trade deficit of $1.608 billion with Russia in the year to late March, saying that imports from Russia reached over $2.116 billion over the period, an increase of 19% compared to the previous year.
Iran’s exports to Russia also increased by 10% year on year in late March to nearly $510 million, he said.
The IRICA chief said trade with Russia had accounted for 77% of Iran’s total trade with the EAEU, a bloc of countries with which Iran has been in a preferential trade arrangement since October 2019.
Kazakhstan was Iran’s second top trading partner in the EAEU with nearly $370 million worth of exchanges in the year to March while Armenia came third at nearly $340 million, said Mir Ashrafi who added that Belarus and Kyrgyzstan were down on the list on $52 million and $48 million, respectively.
IRICA figures showed that trade with EAEU had accounted for 4.6% of Iran’s total trade in the year to late March.
However, Mir Ashrafi said the flow of trade with the EAEU had been mostly stable compared to a 15% decline in trade with the rest of the world reported for the last calendar year because of coroanvirus restrictions.