Smuggling of automotive parts worth $1.5b

Taddol writes that the Secretary of the Automotive-Parts Manufacturers Association, Arash Mohebbinejad believes that illegal imports as well as the imbalance between automotive imports and parts imports can lead to 50% of part manufacturers shutting down, which can lead to the unemployment of 550 thousand people. Mr. Mohebbinejad says that the tariff for importing parts is at 18% which should be doubled to support domestic part manufacturers based on the new import tariff for automotive imports. The total value of imported parts was 1.8 billion dollars last year which shows a 130% growth compared to the previous year. A further 1.5 billion dollars’ worth of parts are also believed to have been imported illegally. This places automotive parts at the top of the imports list. Mr. Mohebbinejad did not comment on the disparity between the quality of imported and domestically manufactured parts.