Iran hand-woven carpet exports rise 16.4% in 9 Months

Speaking during a ceremony to issue ID certificates for Iranian carpets, Ms. Farahnaz Rafe’a said that over 2,762 tons of hand-woven carpets have been exported to the target countries in nine months comparing to the same period last year that the amount was 2,366 tons.

She added that over 2 million people are working in the hand-woven carpet business as 60 percent of them are constant carpet-weavers and 31 percent are also seasonal weavers.

Rafe’a added that over 261,000 carpet-weavers have gone under the shelter of the social security insurance as it is predicted the number to increase by 20 percent next year.

On the statistics regarding the hand-woven carpet output this year, she said the figure has grown by 32 percent in 10 months this year compared to the same period last year.

She reiterated that this year and in 10 months over 1.86 million square meters of hand-woven carpet have been produced while the figure for last year was 1.23 million cubic meters.

She said that today for the 1st time in the past 16 years a ceremony-conference meeting on Iranian handwoven carpets was held in the presence of high-ranking officials, including the 1st vice president, the governor of the Central Bank of Iran (CBI) as well as eight cabinet ministers.

She said that those who have interests in Iranian handwoven carpets are present at the conference and will speak about their concerns and problems, including handwoven carpets’ status of the export market, the customs tariffs for silk thread, customs clearance problems, issuance of artist cards for the carpet weavers, offering them low-interest loans and health insurance services.

The NICC director meanwhile announced that this Thursday and Friday experts meeting will convene for the first time to hear new ideas on the improvement of the Iranian carpets’ national and international markets, including the provision of the raw materials they need using new methods.

She said that in the past emphasis was always made on the point that the handwoven carpets are traditional arts and therefore new technologies should not be applied in their production, whereas the experts meeting is going to break that taboo, and during two days of lectures, workshops, and training, the participants will have a fortnight’s time to present their ideas and projects in electronic media provided for the purpose and receive the answers to their questions.

According to the IRNA reports, during the first eight months of the current (Iranian) year (that began on March 23, 2020) Iranian handwoven carpets worth $47,919,663 were exported to world markets, which was merely less and $800,000 less than the previous year, same period.

According to national employment statistics, by mid-June 2020, 1,200,625 people were weaving carpets across Iran, and 191,545 other professional workers in jobs related to the carpet industry were working to support them.

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