Swiss companies may leave Iran if Vienna talks fail
Chairman of Iran-Switzerland Joint Chamber of Commerce Sharif Nezam-Mafi expressed his disappointment over the barter of tea for oil and said through this kind of barter trade Iran will be unable to import technologies, reiterating that if the JCPOA talks in Vienna fail, remaining Swiss companies in Iran may leave the country.
Speaking to ILNA news agency, Nezam-Mafi said this policy is good for a short time and it cannot resolve the problems of the industry sector and especially production in the long term. He went on to say that in the history of mankind, barter has been a mechanism for trade before money surfaces and there has been definitely a reason that bartering is not in use any longer and if Iran has a plan for the progress of industry, occupation and exports, this mechanism cannot solve its problems with this mechanism.
He then pointed to the barter of oil with tea with Sri Lanka and said it is disappointing that the country uses its national reserves for consumables like tea which is not a vital commodity for our life as the country could at least have barter of oil with medicines for cancer patients or other items which can boost the economy.
"Tea and other commodities are consumed based on the daily habit and it is not a necessary commodity in the lives and one can say the country uses its national reserves just for a habit".
Nezam-Mafi went on to say that it is unlikely the advanced countries to be ready to use mechanisms like barter in their trade and therefore, to meet our production and exports demands, the advance countries in terms of economy will not be ready to use barter mechanism, and they prefer money or credit.
He said Iran can advance this policy of barter ultimately with the third world countries, for example, Sri Lanka which has recently gotten rid of a civil war and has weak economy and it is run based on agriculture.
He went on to say that after the U.S. pullout of the JCPOA, some of Swiss companies still continued their works in Iran but most of them are facing with capital accumulation and they are unable to return their profits or pay the money of their shareholders or they are even unable to pay for import of raw material and parts, and it will not surprising the number of Swiss companies declines next year if the JCPOA does not end to an agreement.
Nezam-Mafi added that several Swiss companies have investments in Iran which are mostly involved in the fields of pharmaceutical, food industry and construction materials but they have problems.
He noted that banking problems have made those companies be unable to work easily and when they problems are accumulated, they reach the fragile point and currently some of those big companies in Iran are reaching this point.
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