A leading Iranian economy official said Turkey and Iran have been in talks to increase the number of items in their preferential trade deal and the two sides will sign a free trade deal when these items hit 265.

“Our desire and goal is to reach a free trade deal,” said Iran’s commercial attaché in Turkey, Hamid Zadboom, in a joint meeting in Ankara, Anadolu Agency reported. Zadboom noted that Turkey imported $6.1 billion of goods from Iran last year and exported goods worth $3.7 billion last year. While Turkey’s exports to Iran soared in the first eight months of the year, its imports from Iran decreased, he added.

“Both the Iranian side and the Turkish side want to boost trade … If we want to boost our trade volume to $30 billion, we need to triple our commercial transactions. We need to make a great deal of efforts to achieve this goal,” Zadboom said.

By Financial Tribune