Iran's Central Bank President Mahmoud Bahmani on Sunday called to reduce imports to cope with the sanctions imposed by the United States and the European Union on Tehran. Bahmani said during a press conference "We should reduce imports and not allow any kind of products to enter.. We should allow only the import of necessary products."
Bahmani said he believed that "this will benefit the country because it will prevent the exit of foreign currencies." He added that the adoption of such a policy will allow "the development of local industry." "They say, for example, they would impose sanctions to prevent the import of gasoline. Should this is the case we need to reduce consumption," he said.
The value of Iranian imports last year, according to the Iranian calendar (from March 2009 to March 2010) amounted to more than US$55 billion, according to figures from the Ministry of Economy.
