Mining in Iran
Many factors have contributed to this, namely lack of suitable infrastructure, legal barriers, exploration difficulties, and government control.
[17] Close to 30 percent of the country's investment has been made in the mining field in recent years.
[19] In the first quarter of 2009–2010, Iran exported close to 5.6 million tons of mineral products worth over $1.2 billion.
In March 2012, the Iran Mercantile Exchange (IME) announced the complete liberalisation of the sale price of raw steel and by-products.
These include coal, iron ore, copper, lead, zinc, chromium,[27] barite (world's sixth largest producer), salt, gypsum, molybdenum, strontium,[28] silica, uranium, and gold (most as a coproduct of the Sarcheshmeh copper complex operations).
Large iron ore deposits exist in central Iran, near Bafq, Yazd, and Kerman.
Iran produces orpiment and realgar arsenic concentrates, silver, asbestos, borax, hydraulic cement, clays (bentonite, industrial, and kaolin), diatomite, feldspar, fluorspar, turquoise, industrial or glass sand (quartzite and silica), lime, magnesite, nitrogen (of ammonia and urea), perlite, natural ocher and iron oxide mineral pigments, pumice and related volcanic materials, caustic soda, stones and decorative stones (including granite, marble, travertine, dolomite, and limestone),[29] celestite, natural sulfates (aluminum potassium sulfate and sodium sulfate), amber, tungsten, agate, lapis lazuli[30] and talc.
Iran also produces ferromanganese, ferromolybdenum, nepheline syenite, demantoids,[31] phosphate rock, selenium, shell, andalusite, rockwool, garnet,[32] gabbro, diorite, vermiculite, attapulgite,[33] calcium, barium, rare earth elements, scandium, yttrium[34][35] and zeolite, and had the capacity to mine onyx.
[37] In 2009 Iran produced 25.5 million tons of iron ore (fines, lumps and concentrate),[38][39][40] – Alternatively, U.S. Geological Survey ranked Iran, the 8th largest producer of iron ore in 2009 with 33 million tons of output.
[42] In 2012, Iran opened a sponge iron plant in Hormozgan Province with a projected annual output of 1.8 million tons.
The gigantic Soviet-built Aryamehr steel works in Isfahan was the leading industrial concentration in the country.
By 1985 had the revolution and war not destroyed everything-new plants at Ahwaz, Bandar Abbas, Isfahan, and other sites would have given Iran steel-producing capacity of over 15 million tons a year.
The extraction of more than 22 million minerals and the employment of more than four thousand people have turned mines into golden treasures in Mazandaran.
[73] In 2020, provincial officials announced the discovery of large gold reserves in southeast Sistan and Baluchestan after extensive exploration and survey stages were completed.
Iranian officials dubbed Sistan and Baluchestan the "mineral rainbow" of Iran, with the most lucrative reserves of antimony, titanium, copper and gold.
[citation needed] In 2009 Iran produced some 65 million tons of cement per year and exported to 40 countries.
In the steel and copper sectors alone, the government is seeking to raise around US$1.1 billion in foreign financing.
In the early 1990s the buy-back method of transaction (the government buys back the industrial project after the foreign direct investor has recouped his initial investment in the project plus a predefined profit) was introduced to bypass constitutional constraints on foreign investment and avoid potential political difficulties within the country.
If the Iranian Government is to fulfil its 20-year plan to improve the country's mining sector, it's estimated that US$20 billion, mostly in foreign investment, will be required.
Most of the electrical distribution equipment for water supply and treatment utilities, along with steelworks and storage facilities are manufactured locally.
[79] In this regard, countries which can maintain a neutral and impartial political image in the Middle East are advantaged.
