Armenia to invite Iran to set up free trade area by end of 2017 - official
YEREVAN. Dec 21 (Interfax) - Yerevan will familiarize Tehran with a plan of setting up a free trade area in the Megri district of the Syunik region in the southern part of the country, Armenian Deputy Economic Development and Investment Minister Hovhannes Azizyan said.
"We are going to discuss opportunities for setting up a free trade area and joint ventures, which should enable our producers to export goods to Iran and Iranian producers to the EAEU [the Eurasian Economic Union] and countries with which Armenia has preferential trade agreements," Azizyan told journalists at an Armenian-Iranian business forum in Yerevan on Wednesday.
The establishment of a free trade area "will become a reality by the end of 2017," he said.
The business forum will help increase the volume of trade and bilateral investments between the two countries, he said.
"The pharmaceutical sector will be quite appealing to Iran. Iran has a fairly developed pharmacological industry. We are considering the possibility of exporting medicines to the EAEU market by setting up joint ventures, taking into consideration that a common market of medicines will start functioning on January 1," Azizyan said.
Armenia and Iran are looking to increase their annual trade turnover to $220 million and double this figure in years to come, he said.
"At the present time, exports from Armenia to Iran amount to about $70 million-$80 million and those from Iran to Armenia $150 million-$170 million," Azizyan said.