Iran to Develop Saffron Commodity Fund: Deputy Minister
TEHRAN (Tasnim) - An official of the Iranian Ministry of Agriculture Jihad said the ministry is going to conduct a parallel survey on both domestic and abroad markets of saffron by adopting a national road map for saffron market.
Hossein Shirzad, who is also the chief executive officer of the Central Organization for Rural Cooperatives of Iran (CORC), said that the CORC will facilitate integrated management of the saffron value chain through the development of a legal entity.
He said non-membership of Iran in the WTO was a key reason for exporting saffron in bulk, adding that Iran should find a way to overcome these restrictions.
Moreover, Shirzad noted that the lack of an official reference for pricing, and weak logistic were significant challenges of Iran’s leadership over the saffron market.
As regards saffron commodity fund, he noted that by the development of the saffron commodity fund, the collected deposits will be concentrated on the development of an integrated marketing system for saffron.
Meanwhile, this fund delivers several benefits to investors including portfolio diversification, protection against inflation and dumping and facilitating potential financial growth.