Referring to the power outages in the province's industries and stating that many of these enterprises are producers of basic goods for the people, the head of the Kermanshah Chamber said: "There is no support for the industries whose electricity is cut off."

In the 69th session of the Government-Private Sector Negotiation Council of the Kermanshah Province, Keivan Kashefi first mentioned the electricity shortage that the country is facing and added: "Unfortunately, for the first time and with the prioritization that has been made, we are witnessing power outages in industries and producer enterprises in the province."

Stating that the power outage has faced serious challenges and shutdowns in the production sector, he highlighted that many of these enterprises are producers of basic goods needed by the people and they cannot comply with their production obligations under these conditions.

He believes that special supports should be lent in the face of such pressure on industries.

Kashefi then added about the performance of governmental departments in realizing this year's naming under the title of "Production, Supports, and Barriers-removal": "We demand that governmental departments have more cooperation in presenting their performance about naming this year. In addition, governmental departments such as banks should present their performance in the field of making payments for facilities, working capital, etc., as well as other governmental departments such as Social Security (Organization) and Tax Offices should provide their measures in the field of incentives and exemptions to see what real support and barrier-removal have been lent and conducted for producer enterprises this year.

We must seriously support the business expansion

The Kermanshah Province governor said: "We must seriously support the expansion of business and producers of different sectors in the year of supporting the production and removing barriers."

Referring to the naming of this year as Production Support and Barrier-removal, Houshang Bazvand emphasized: "This year, we are all obliged to provide the necessary conditions to facilitate the business expansion and producers support and the farmer, who wants to produce, should benefit from various services and there should not be any obstacles for the farmer's work.

The head of the Iran-Syria Joint Chamber announced a 36% increase in exports to this country in the first four months of this year and said: "$ 66 million worth of goods were exported to Syria in the first four months of this year."

Pointing to the plan to export $ 200 million to this country this year, Keivan Kashefi highlighted: "If this goal-setting is achieved, we will witness an 80% growth in exports compared to the last year."

Establishment of the exhibition of Iran's capabilities in Syria

The head of the Iran-Syria Joint Chamber also mentioned the holding of an exhibition on the capabilities of the Islamic Republic of Iran in Damascus in November this year, adding: The permission to hold this exhibition is issued by the Syrian Ministry of Economy and will be co-organized by the Iran International Exhibition Company and the Iran-Syria Joint Chamber.

Kashefi considered the importance of this exhibition important for increasing economic exchanges between the two countries and continued: In addition, some negotiations between officials of the two countries to speed up transportation, increase in flights, the possibility of financial exchanges among banks and currency exchange offices, etc. has been conducted to speed up trade relations between Iran and Syria.

In the end, Kashefi announced the development of an independent long-term plan for the presence of Iranian companies in Syria reconstruction and participation in various reconstruction and development projects in this country.

Since the beginning of this year and due to the outbreak of coronavirus disease, Kermanshah Chamber of Commerce has continued its training seminars online to provide the topics needed for economic activities with those interested. We have witnessed three webinars with titles on social security topics and regulations, startup businesses management and getting to know knowledge-based companies in Kermanshah Chamber in this regard in recent times.

More than 160 hours of training in specialized fields were presented to the interested parties in each of these webinars.

The participants in these webinars received the relevant certificates after participation in this course.

The aim of these plans is to raise the level of knowledge and awareness of economic activists.

The head of the Kermanshah Chamber of Commerce mentioned the Kermanshah capacity as a trade hub of Iran and Iraq and continued: This is due to the geopolitical position of the province and border capacities that few provinces in the country have.

Keivan Kashefi mentioned the existence of five official borders in the province and said that a border like Khosravi has a long history in trade exchanges and passenger traffic, adding that the borders of Parvizkhan, Shoushami and Sheikh Saleh also provide a good access to the Kurdish part of Iraq.

Kashfi mentioned the advantages of the Somar border and its short distance from the Arab part of Iraq, adding: "This border alone can bring $ 1 billion in exports a year to the province if it does not have infrastructure problem."

Agriculture as the Kermanshah economic leap platform

He went on to say that the Kermanshah economic advantages are not merely limited to trade, adding that agriculture is also one of the important capacities of Kermanshah and the spring of the province's economic leap.

The board member of the Iranian Chamber of Commerce mentioned the breadth of Kermanshah's agricultural sector and its significant contribution to job creation in the province and continued: Kermanshah is a brand in some agricultural products, including chickpeas, and Kermanshah's livestock is famous in the Persian Gulf countries.

Emphasizing the necessity to pay attention to conversion industries for the prosperity of the province's agricultural sector, the head of the Kermanshah Chamber of Commerce said: In some products including chickpeas, A to Z of production to processing can be launched in Kermanshah.

The Kermanshah necessity to enter the first circle of tourism in the country

Stating that Kermanshah should be the first circle of tourism in the country, he added: "Kermanshah has more advantages in this area than many other provinces."

Pointing out that the tourism has currently found a way in the portfolio of all households with any amount of income and has changed into one of the main capacities of the country, the board member of the Iranian Chamber of Commerce reminded: Nowadays, it is time to focus on this sector in Kermanshah Province.

The head of the Kermanshah Chamber expressed concern about the re-restriction of livestock exports in a meeting of the government-private sector dialogue council of the Kermanshah province and said: There are issues in the form of a directive to limit the export of livestock to certain individuals, to consider a limited time for it and the quota of export animals should also be restricted.

Keivan Kashefi mentioned the livestock as a strategic product that Kermanshah Province has always had a significant share of the country's livestock exports and added: Kermanshah should not be deprived of this important capacity.

Then, he mentioned the Fund for Supporting the Agricultural Sector Development as an accelerator in the field of agriculture and called for solving the problems of the fund and an increase its capital.

The head of the Kermanshah Chamber believes that injecting liquidity into the fund could help boost the agricultural sector.

Injection of 200 billion rials of credit into the Fund for Supporting the Agriculture sector

Then, Kermanshah Province Governor, Houshang Bazvand, pointed out the importance of the province's Agricultural Development Fund and said: "This fund can help projects in agricultural sector."

He also agreed to inject 20 billion tomans contribution into the province's Agricultural Development Fund and expressed hope that this would also cause the development of county-wide agricultural funds.

The head of the Kermanshah Chamber of Commerce said: the future government will take over the country with serious challenges, but there are great expectations from them.

Stating that the new (Iranian) government will take over the country with serious challenges and difficulties, the main of which is the economic one, Keivan Kashefi considered the high inflation rate, which was approximately 40% in the first quarterly, as one of these super-challenges in a summit of economic activists with Kermanshah representative in the Islamic Consultative Assembly and added: "The increasing trend of the inflation has gradually shown its impact on the currency value and also affects the prices of goods."

The board member of the Iranian Chamber of Commerce said that international sanctions and the undesirable environment of business are among the other problems facing the future government.

Kashefi expressed hope that, despite all these problems, with the beginning of the thirteenth government and the coordination, which will be established among the Three Systems, we will witness great things in the country that the people are waiting for.

The head of the Kermanshah Chamber of Commerce said that the restoration of the private sector position is another point that the future government should consider and highlighted: It is not permissible for an economic activist to constantly request for the directives, general manager and even the expert of a department in order to advance his/her work and get involved in the rules and instructions.

Allocation of one hundred thousand billion tomans of cheap resources to support investment

The Kermanshah representative in the Islamic Consultative Assembly also announced the allocation of 100,000 billion tomans of resources for investment in different parts of the country for the first time and said: "We are due to include this credit (amount) in the form of Investment Support Fund at the next year."

Ebrahim Azizi said that the country's advancement requires several important factors, including manpower, entrepreneurs, and private sector organizations, and added: "Easy and fluent laws and regulations are among the other needs of the country's advancement."

The board member of the Iran Chamber of Commerce considered organizing the budgeting system, improving the business environment, economic exchanges with the world and combating corruption as four main economic priorities that the 13th government must address.

Stating that economic problems have currently become the country’s main challenge, the consequences of which have affected the people's lives and the future government should seriously pursue the resolution of economic problems, Keivan Kashefi said: The government should prioritize to organize economic challenges.

He added: "Of course, we should not forget that solving all these problems will not be possible within six months or a year, and it needs to be continued to reach the desired point."

According to the head of the Kermanshah Chamber, there are four important core issues that the government will settle other problems to some extent like a domino if addresses them.

He believes that although the country is facing other economic challenges, including funds such as Social Security and Pensions, Stock Exchanges, etc., if these four economic priorities are removed, then many of the country's economic problems will improve.

The crisis, which gripped the world economy in 2008, is by no means comparable to the current era, both in terms of severity and impact and no event had changed or damaged the world’s economy as much as the Coronavirus did since the World War II according to economists. The crisis caused by the Coronavirus pandemic plunged the global trade into a deep recession disrupting the supply chain and there are just signs of improved trade in parts of the world more than a year later; the signs that are specific to advanced economies and these signs of improvement have little to do with Iran. In the same way that Iran has not been very successful in caring for and preventing the spread of the disease and its control, it has not made significant progress in caring for the economy and economic activists. The coronavirus outbreak in the last days of 2019 affected the world economy beyond forecasts and caused the most severe damages to sub-sectors of the economy, which were related to the trade, due to limited communication and closing borders. Recently, during a webinar, the WTO interpreted the Coronavirus outbreak as a storm that cut global trade in goods and services in 2020 to 24% conclusively. On the other hand, the increase in world transportation prices also exerted a heavier burden on world trade during the same time interval. Unlike the global financial crisis in 2008, which affected only parts of the world economy, the coronavirus challenged individual countries and sub-sectors of the economy; Iran was not safe from the crisis either. For the first time in two decades, Iran's trade has run a deficit. While from the beginning of 1999 to 2019, Iran has always witnessed a trade surplus in all seasons, it faced a deficit of $ 200 million in exports compared to imports in 2020. Sanctions, the coronavirus outbreak and the sharp drop in oil prices came together to form one of Iran's biggest and most serious economic challenges during 2020.

More challenging than the events imposed on the Iranian economy over the past year, what has always further weakened the face of the weak private sector of the economy and limited their breadth more is that it has been pointed out: There is no signs of improvement in the country's trade and economic trend. Now, almost 15 months after the start of the Coronavirus epidemic, the world's major economies have either recovered or are on the path to recovery, but economic activists in Iran are still ignored to be on spotlight and be supported.

The fact that the economies of developed and advanced countries were able to overcome the crisis and to be on the path to recovery was beyond the great economic capacities and potential of strong companies and relied on government support. Countries such as the United States, China, and South Korea dedicated 10% of GDP to support the coronavirus-damaged businesses and the figure was even higher at 18% in countries such as Germany and Japan. In total, the global average of government supports for economic activists in the Coronavirus crisis was not less than 5% of GDP. This is while the government supports did not exceed 3% in Iran according to the government statistics.

The government's challenges in financing due to sanctions and limited oil sales, on the one hand, and, of course, distrust of the private sector's position in Iran's oil-based economy, on the other hand, have caused the government's plan to support the economic activists in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak not to be so effective. Nevertheless, nowadays, the survival conditions for private sector activists have become more difficult than before, and a slight delay for crisis management could lead to a catastrophe on a larger scale. Nowadays, private sector conditions are to some extent similar to dried groundwater aquifers; the life of the groundwater aquifers depend on the flow of water in them and they will disappear if their drying time is prolonged and then, any amount of rain hitting these groundwater sources will have no effect; because the aquifers function depends on the existence of sources and grooves under the ground and they disappear due to the excessive dryness. The private sector is currently in the same situation as well. Restrictions resulted from the sanctions and the spread of the coronavirus on the one hand, and disruptive laws and barriers to business on the other hand, are drying all capacities of the private sector. If this happens once, then a huge amount of resources and supports of the government will not be effective either and will be like the rain in the salt marshes.

Now, in the current situation where there is neither signs of coronavirus control nor a clear hope for the reduction of sanctions, and Iran's trade wheel has taken on a difficult and rocky path, what should be done so that the country's trade table does not dry up? The most explicit and eloquent answer to this challenge lies in the slogan of the year proposed by the Supreme Leader: Barrier-removal. There is no doubt that the economic challenges caused by the coronavirus will continue until the end of 1400 and there is little hope that the international sanctions will fade during this time interval. However, at the moment, removing disruptive business laws and facilitating the trade is the greatest service the government can do to save the coronavirus-hit economy. Facilitating disruptive laws and intrusive and unprofessional regulations in the four areas of taxation, social security, customs, and finally banking and the capital market, can allow the private sector, as the backbone of the economy, to pass safely through this delimeter whirlpool.

Keivan Kashefi

Board member of the Iran Chamber