SHANA -- Iranian Minister of Petroleum Bijan Zangeneh said preventing sale of raw materials including crude oil and gas was one of the main plans of the Iranian Ministry of Petroleum, adding production of $25-billion worth of petrochemicals by 2021 was a major leap in the industry which would continue.

Addressing the opening ceremony of the 13th Iran Plast International Exhibition on Sunday, the official said the country was on the threshold of the third leap in the petrochemical industry.

�Back in the 1997, under President Khatami, when I was the then-minister of petroleum, the value of petrochemical output of the country was $1 billion, but we could launch a large number of petrochemical projects by the efforts of the administration, the Iranian Ministry of Petroleum and the National Petrochemical Company (NPC) until 2005,� he said.

Zangeneh further said that Iran�s ethane production capacity would reach 16 million tons per year by 2021 from 4.2 mt/y back in 2013. The items� current production capacity is 7.3 mt/y.

He said that the country�s petrochemical production capacity would cross 100 mt/y by 2021, adding 27 projects will come on stream in the country by 2021.

The official said that the petrochemical production capacity of the country would reach 130 mt/y by 2025 valued at $37 billion.