TEHRAN, Jan. 21 (MNA) Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad-Javad Zarif has expressed hope that the annual bilateral trade with Turkmenistan will double in the near future to $10 billion.He made the statement on the sidelines of the 13th joint economic committee meeting of Iran and Turkmenistan which opened on Monday in Turkmenistans city of Ashgabat.
Zarif chaired the meeting jointly with his Turkmen counterpart Rashid Meredov.
The foreign ministers will discuss bilateral ties in different fields of energy, transportation, telecommunications, and agriculture during the two-day meeting.
Some 80 traders and businessmen from private and public sectors of the two sides will attend a conference on the sidelines of the meeting.
Iran and Turkmenistan seek to double their trade exchanges to $10 billion in the near future.
The current value of annual trade transactions between Tehran and Ashgabat is $5 billion, while the figure stood at $1.3 billion in 2006.
A recent report by the Trade Promotion Organization of Iran on Iran-Turkmenistan trade relations shows that the two countries held six cooperation meetings between 2001 and 2012.
The most important documents exchanged between the two countries were trade agreements on encouraging and supporting investment, agreements on avoidance of double taxation, and memoranda of understanding on business cooperation.
Iran is reportedly Turkmenistans second largest trade partner after Russia.
The Islamic Republic exports machinery, construction materials, sedans, buses, food stuff, agricultural and petrochemical products, electrical products and home appliances to Turkmenistan, and imports natural gas, electricity, textiles and agricultural products from its northern neighbor.
By Mehr News Agency
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