iran - Economy
Picture of rial]] is Iran's official currency
[[rial is Iran's official currency]]
[[was one of the first cities in Iran which was modernized in the Pahlavi era. It currently hosts 45% of Iran's large industries.]]
[[is a free-trade zone, which is quickly becoming a major tourist destination.]]
Iran's economy is a mixture of central planning, state ownership of oil and other large enterprises, village agriculture, and small-scale private trading and service ventures. Its economic infrastructure has been improving steadily over the past two decades but continues to be affected by inflation and unemployment. In the early twenty-first century the service sector contributed the largest percentage of the GDP, followed by industry (mining and manufacturing) and agriculture. About 45 percent of the government's budget came from oil and natural gas revenues, and 31 percent came from taxes and fees. Government spending contributed to an average annual inflation rate of 14 percent in the period 2000–2004. In 2006 the GDP was estimated at $193.5 billion ($599.2 billion at PPP), or $2,440 per capita ($8,700 at PPP). 1 Because of these figures and the country’s diversified but small industrial base, the United Nations classifies Iran's economy as semi-developed.
The services sector has seen the greatest long-term growth in terms of its share of GDP, but the sector remains volatile. State investment has boosted agriculture with the liberalization of production and the improvement of packaging and marketing helping to develop new export markets. Thanks to the construction of many dams throughout the country in recent years, large-scale irrigation schemes, and the wider production of export-based agricultural items like dates, flowers, and pistachios, produced the fastest economic growth of any sector in Iran over much of the 1990s. Although successive years of severe drought in 1998, 1999, 2000 and 2001 have held back output growth substantially, agriculture remains one of the largest employers, accounting for 22% of all jobs according to the 1991 census.
Iran's major commercial partners are China, Germany, South Korea, France, Japan, Russia and Italy. Since the late 1990s, Iran has increased its economic cooperation with other developing countries, including Syria, India, Cuba, Venezuela, and South Africa. Iran is also expanding its trade ties with Turkey and Pakistan and shares with its partners the common goal of creating a single economic market in West and Central Asia, much like the European Union called ECO. Iran also expects to attract billions of dollars of foreign investment by creating a more favorable investment climate, such as reduced restrictions and duties on imports, and free-trade zones in Chabahar, Qeshm and Kish Island.
The current administration continues to follow the market reform plans of the previous one and indicated that it will diversify Iran's oil-reliant economy. It is attempting to do this by investing revenues in areas like automobile manufacturing, aerospace industries, consumer electronics, petrochemicals and nuclear technology. Iran has also developed a biotechnology, nanotechnology, and pharmaceuticals industry. The strong oil market since 1996 helped ease financial pressures on Iran and allowed for Tehran's timely debt service payments. Iranian budget deficits have been a chronic problem, in part due to large-scale state subsidies, totaling more than $40 billion per year, that include foodstuffs and especially gasoline. _http://www.payvand.com/news/07/jan/1295.html_