Iran’s Fars News outlet reported on Tuesday that Tehran is aggressively courting foreign investors, conveying statements made by Valiollah Afkhamirad, the head of Iran’s Trade Development Organization, that the interim Joint Plan of Action (JPA) inked last November in Geneva had created “a suitable atmosphere… [for] investors in Iran and they have become highly interested in business” with the Islamic Republic.
Iranian Minister of Communications and Information Technology Mahmoud Vaezi voiced Tehran’s enthusiasm for paving the ground for more partnership of foreign companies in the country’s economy, specially in the telecommunications sector.
Addressing the World Telecommunication Development Conference in Dubai, the UAE, on Monday, Vaezi said that Iran was committed to facilitate the establishment of partnerships with foreign companies for ultra broadband corridors across Iran. “Iran has invited world countries to invest and collaborate in projects to establish partnerships for ultra broadband corridors across the Islamic Republic,” the Iranian minister said.
The calls echo a February boast by Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif announcing that the sanctions relief outlined by the JPA had transformed Iran into a place that was “open for business.” They came alongside other reports describing a “steady flow of Western executives” into Iran.
Meanwhile British financial reporter Matt Lynn assessed on MarketWatch that Iran seems primed to become “one of the hottest investment opportunities of the next two decades.”
It has decent levels of education — roughly the same as Turkey — and the added advantage of oil. Its energy resources are rich enough to fuel the economy, without being quite so large relative to its population that it turns into a petro state such as Saudi Arabia. There are not many other frontier markets with that kind of profile.
The Iranian strategy seems primed to deepen a very particular worry regarding the possibility that the JPA’s partial erosion of the international sanctions regime will prevent financial pressure from being reimposed on Iran: Foreign entities that become invested in Iranian markets are likely to mobilize political pressure to prevent any moves to close those markets back off.
Brookings fellow Michael Doran had already in January speculated that the JPA “has created an influential economic lobby in the West dedicated to ensuring” that sanctions are not tightened again. Such concerns have become more pitched in recent months, as Iran has moved in to encourage foreign investment across a range of industries.
[Photo: Jack Jane / YouTube]