Iranian Ministry of Industry, Mine and Trade has issued a decree for removing the ban on rice import from Nov. 22.
According to the decree, rice import will be free for 7 months.
All rice importers must provide needed obligations for clearance of the imported rice before July 22, 2018.
The Iranian government bans rice import annually with only a few months of break to support domestic products.
The Iranian government implements 26 percent customs duty for rice import.
The annual consumption of rice in Iran is three million tons and each Iranian averagely consumes about 38 kilograms of rice per year.
It appears that the high output of rice this year has caused confusion among the importers as about 1.8 million tons of rice was imported into the country. This is while the country’s total imports of rice over the last two years stood at 1.5 million tons.
According to Iran’s Customs Administration, the country imported $995 million worth of rice over the first half of the current year, indicating a surge of 109 percent in value terms.