SIPIEM head
Iran over 85% self-sufficient in manufacturing oil industry equipment
He said the domestic oil industry’s self-sufficiency in producing 85 percent of the required equipment means that no country can sanction Iran anymore.
Iran produces over 85 percent of the oil industry equipment domestically, said the chairman of the board of directors of the Society of Iranian Petroleum Industries Equipment Manufacturers (SIPIEM).
In an address to a press conference on Monday, Majid Mohammadpour put the number of the SIPIEM’s subsidiary companies at 820, IRNA reported.
Of the total number the subsidiaries, 182 companies are technology-based, he said, noting that the same number of firms are undergoing the process of becoming technology-based.
These subsidiaries, Mohammadpour added, have created 80,000 directed and 250,000 indirect jobs.
He said in view of the firms’ capabilities, the domestic capacity of producing oil industry equipment is estimated at €5 billion.
Mohammadpour noted that 47 percent of the SIPIEM subsidiaries are based in the Iranian capital of Tehran and 11 percent in the southwestern province of Khuzestan.
He said if the country’s economic conditions improve and the coronavirus spread is curbed, 100 other subsidiaries will become technology-based by 2022.
Mohammadpour stressed that domestic manufacturers of oil industry equipment are not operating at full capacity due to the US sanctions on Iran and the drop in crude prices.
He said the domestic oil industry’s self-sufficiency in producing 85 percent of the required equipment means that no country can sanction Iran anymore.
In May 2018, the US, under an executive order by President Donald Trump, withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), signed between Iran and the P5+1 in July 2015, and reimposed its unilateral sanctions on the Islamic Republic.
US reinstatement of the sanctions on Iran was part of Washington’s “maximum pressure” campaign against Tehran aiming to bring the Islamic Republic to the negotiating table to work out a new agreement.
Still in place, the unilateral sanctions, the most draconian of all time, have mainly targeted Iranian oil and banking sectors in a bid to cripple the country’s economy. They have, however, proved ineffective thanks to Iranian people’s resilience over the past three years.
Mohammadpour noted that the government has set an export target of 2.3 million barrels of crude oil and gas condensate per day in the budget bill for the next Iranian calendar year, to start in March 2021.
He said Iran ranks first in the Middle East in the production of oil industry equipment and can become the region’s hub in this sector.
On Sunday, a senior Iranian Oil Ministry official said crude output in the country can be restored to levels recorded before the US sanctions were imposed on the country only in a matter of a single day, according to Press TV.
“Iran is ready to lift its mandatory reduction in oil output to bring production to 95 percent of the pre-sanction levels within one single day,” said Ahmad Mohammadi, who serves as the CEO of the National Iranian South Oil Company (NISOC).
Some maintain Iran’s exports of oil could exceed four million bpd if the US sanctions start to ease after Joe Biden takes over as US president.
NISOC, a subsidiary of the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC), is responsible for oil operations at areas in southern Iran that account for more than 80 percent of the country’s total output.