Iranian official: Iran exports petrochemicals to 60 countries

TEHRAN,April 8(MNA) - Iran exported some $14 billion worth of petrochemical products to 60 countries last calendar year, which ended on March 19, said the National Petrochemical Company’s (NPC) managing director on Saturday. Abdolhossein Bayat added that $10.5 billion of oil income will be allocated to the development of national petrochemical industries, Pana news agency reported. Iran has developed 69 plans to boost its petrochemical output from this year’s 54 million tons to 100 million tons in 2015. The NPC production manager, Mohammad-Ali Bassaqzadeh, said that 30 kinds of petrochemical products have been exported to Asian, European, and African countries in the past 11 months. Bassaqzadeh said that the figure shows a 75 percent increase compared with the same period last year. He expressed hope that Iran's petrochemical exports would hit the planned target of 14 billion dollars by March 19, the last day of the Iranian calendar year. Western Europe and China are the main recipients of Iran's petrochemical exports, followed by Southeast Asia, the Middle East, the Subcontinent, Africa and Latin America.