Nobakht said on Monday that non-oil exports to 15 neighboring and near countries should reach $48 billion in the next Iranian calendar year (March 21, 2020-March 20, 2021), adding that hitting the target was necessary given Iran’s urgent need to new foreign currency revenues as normal crude sale has been affected by American sanctions.

He said that Iran had been effectively deprived of around $50 billion a year in oil sales income, adding that non-oil exports should compensate for that loss.

“Based on the targets set, we (have to) bring the non-oil exports to $48 billion from the $24-billion that we currently have,” he said, adding that setting the target had been agreed earlier in the day in a meeting involving high-profile government officials.

Iran has been under a series of US sanctions since last year when Washington unilaterally withdrew from an international agreement on Tehran’s nuclear program.

The sanctions have specifically targeted the sale of oil as the United States seeks to force Iran to change its position on key foreign policy and security issues.

Authorities in Tehran admit that sanctions have affected Iran’s exports although they insist the bans have caused a boom in other sectors of the economy.

Bulk of Iran’s non-oil exports, especially those shipped to 15 neighboring and near countries, consists of petrochemical products derived from oil.

The new target set for exports mainly relies on a massive expansion of Iran’s petrochemical sector over the past few years. Authorities said in September that petchem exports would increase nine-fold to reach $93 billion in 2025.

Early in this month, Governor of the Central Bank of Iran (CBI) Abdolnasser Hemmati in an Instagram post said despite the United States’ growing sanctions against Iran, his nation’s economy is moving forward in areas of trade, including both oil and non-oil exports.

“Brian Hook: Iran’s oil exports reached 120,000 barrels per day,” Hemmati wrote on his Instagram page.

The CBI governor noted that the US has imposed new sanctions on imports and exports in construction sector, adding that the US together with 6 regional states has sanctioned 25 individuals or entities.

Last month, President of Iran’s Trade Promotion Organization Hamid Zadbum announced that Iran’s non-oil exports had witnessed a 22.5% increase in terms of weight in the first half of the current local calendar year (March 21-August 21) compared with the corresponding period in the last year, showing a steady rise in resistance against the United States’ economic sanctions.

Iranian exports saw a rise of 22.5% in weight in the last six months (March 21-September 21) in comparison to the same period last year, said Zadbum in the central city of Kashan.

He mentioned that Iran’s machine-made carpet exports are gaining in value and weight, noting that the country is trying to regain the lost market to other international competitors.