Iran’s Resistance Economy Defeats US Sanctions

American bullying put Islamic Iran on the road to self-sufficiency

Waseem Shehzad

Early last month, the Financial Times reported that “the stock market of Iran, for a long time dogged by US sanctions, has notched up a notable achievement: ranking among the world’s best performing over the past 12 months, as domestic investors seek refuge from rampant inflation.” This is not the kind of news one expects from a leading Western newspaper about a country considered an enemy and under severe Western sanctions for 40 years.

Since day one of the Islamic Revolution in 1979, Iran has been under Western sanctions. From developing its medical sector to the level of rivaling global medical leaders and becoming a regional destination for medical tourism, to significantly reducing its dependency on oil income, Iran’s economic performance is extremely impressive.

From 2013 onward, Iran embarked on an economic program geared toward significantly reducing its budgetary reliance on oil. Even according to the US dominated World Bank, in 2014 while under severe sanctions, the Iranian economy expanded by 3%. By 2016, Iran had managed to reduce its dependency on oil revenues from over 50% to about 33%.

One of the leading economic websites covering Iran from a secular capitalist perspective noted that “in early-2014, Iran’s Ministry of Energy unveiled its plans for adding some 5 GW of renewable power capacity, mostly wind, to the country’s power fleet by 2018. Since the beginning of 2014, construction for around 400 MW of renewable capacity has started, and contracts for more than 500 MW have been awarded. The Iranian government increased its budget for renewable energy by more than 400% last year to around $60 million; although still small, the growth is going in the right direction.”

Since the US unilaterally withdrew from the multilateral nuclear agreement referred to as JCPOA, Donald Trump’s regime turned to economic sabotage in an effort to undermine Iran’s economy. Perhaps Trump does not realize that Iran has been under Western sanctions for decades and has mastered the art of bypassing sanctions.

In the field of economics trust and belief in a system are crucial factors in overcoming economic obstacles. People buy Coca-Cola in preference to other soft-drink brands because they trust and believe in the Coke brand. It is not because Coca-Cola is healthier or significantly different from other brands of soft drinks.

Iran’s ability to withstand decades of sanctions clearly created trust in the domestic market as the stock market data shows. Confidence of the domestic market and domestic consumption are crucial economic factors making Iran resistant to external economic terrorism.

Iran’s resistance economy policies outlined by Imam Seyyed Ali Khamenei insulated Iran from the severe effects of Western sanctions. One of the key aspects of its resistance economy is “consumption management based on the promotion of consumption of local products parallel to the qualitative improvement of domestic production.”

As recently pointed out by Amin Saikal, Professor of Political Science at the Australian National University, “US President Donald Trump’s approach to bringing Iran’s Islamic regime to heel clearly is not working.”

Soon after the JCPOA was signed in 2015, Crescent International pointed out that “sooner or later sanctions will be re-imposed. The Islamic leadership in Iran understands this as well. Therefore, they will make the maximum effort to use this new phase to prepare for future possible sanctions. At the economic level, Islamic Iran will continue to boost its non-oil and manufacturing sector as this is part of the resistance economic plan outlined by Imam Seyyed Ali Khamenei years ago. Iran will most probably continue enhancing its regional trade.”

Iran’s near-miraculous economic performance under very tough externally imposed obstacles is a strategic step in highlighting the fact that a non-Western economic framework can work. To understand Iran’s economic achievement, one needs to do a simple comparison of its performance with Egypt, Morocco, Azerbaijan, Tunisia, or many other countries that regularly receive handouts from Western financial institutions. They function with no obstacles within the Western designed economic system. NATO-imposed or tolerated regimes in the Muslim world are not known for any indigenous economic achievements. Their survival is due to their ties to capitalist economic institutions and following the Western paradigm.

Iran’s economic successes are deliberately downplayed, and its economic challenges exaggerated. If Iran’s stock market had underperformed, this news would dominate headlines of the corporate media for weeks. However, since its stock market outstripped others in performance, this news was barely reported. Those Western corporate media outlets that reported it did not give it much prominence.

A good example of how Iran’s economic performance is constantly misrepresented would be to recall the financial crisis of 2009. At the time, the Western media was constantly beaming absurd messages of how the financial crisis negatively affected Iran even though the Islamic Republic was under sanctions and was not exposed to the US sub-prime mortgage crisis in any way. Such false reports were deliberately spread simply to undermine the Iranian people’s confidence in the Islamic economic paradigm.

For the foreseeable future, Iran’s economic sector will be under intense pressure. It is primarily due to the fact that Western economies are not doing well. In these circumstances if an economic system outside of the capitalist framework manages to perform well, it will put the entire Western economic paradigm into question.

The economic performance of any state is dependent on several factors, not all of them related to economics. Self-confidence of leaders of any state is a crucial starting point. This cannot come about if one suffers from mental colonization as most rulers in the Muslim world do. They cannot think outside the Western framework and have little understanding or respect for Islamic principles. Most of these rulers also do not enjoy mass support. Hence, they are dependent on Western military, political, and economic support. In short, they are slaves of the West.

In Islamic Iran’s case, it has made a conscious choice to detach itself from the dependency syndrome and while it has been subjected to severe sanctions— economic terrorism, in the words of its Foreign Minister Dr. Javad Zarif — the leadership in Iran has stood firm on Islamic principles. Its success in many diverse fields is nothing short of miraculous.

Its path to success is paved by the resistance economy. This is an important lesson for other countries — Muslim as well as non-Muslim — that are subjected to Western bullying and economic terrorism.

4 decades of Islamic Republic's achievements (7)

Iran is a unique country in the field of huge reserves not just of oil and gas but many minerals and ores. Thus, it is one of the third rich countries in this regard and that's is why it is called the paradise of mines.

7% of the entire world minerals amounting to 40 billion tons are in Iran. In view of this, Iran stands among the top 10 countries in the world. Yet, experts are of the opinion that only 20% of Iran's mines have been discovered so far. From among 68 minerals in Iran, mention can be made of copper, zinc, gold, coal, and iron ore. After the triumph of the Islamic Revolution in 1979, the trend of discovery and extraction of minerals have accelerated. 5873 out of 8840 mines discovered in the country are active. The substances taken from these mines are exported after meeting the domestic needs. Last year, the value of exported minerals was more than $2 billion. Iran, with over 2 billion tons of copper reserves, holds 4% of this mineral in the world. The largest copper mine in Iran is situated in Kerman province in the south of the country. Moreover, the Golgohar iron ore mine in in Kerman province is the largest iron mine in West Asia with 220 million tons of definite reserves. Anguran mine in Zanjan province, west of the country, holding 9 million tons of lead reserves, is the largest one in West Asia. Zarshuran mine in northwest of Iran, with 150 thousand tons of gold reserves, has increased the country's ingot production to 5.5 tons annually.

The old and famous Neishabur turquoise mine in northeastern Iran is the largest turquoise mine in the world. The product of this mine is so high in quality that acts as a yardstick for other types of turquoise.

The Islamic Republic of Iran is a vast country; so, it needs a broad transportation system. Before the Islamic Revolution, the roads of the country reached 46 thousand kilometers connecting mainly large cities together. But, after the victory of the Islamic revolution, road construction was totally developed. Now the length of roads between cities amounts to more than 210 thousand kilometers which have improved both in terms of quality and safety. Approximately, 18 thousand kilometers of these roads are expressways and highways. The point to note is that the number of cars and vehicles has dramatically increased in comparison with the pre-revolution period. In other words, there are more than 16 million cars moving on the roads across the country while the figure was 1.2 million cars before the revolution. The number of buses in the country is 16 thousand which transfer travelers to and from their destinations. There are 360 thousand trucks and other transportation cars which transfer 550 million tons of loads to the cities and villages. Iran shares land borders with 7 countries. This requires to have safe and suitable roads and active and equipped border terminals for transportation. Currently, many trucks transport goods to the neighboring countries and bring their goods to the country.

Railway is one of the safest routes for transportation of loads and travelers. After the victory of the Islamic Revolution, railways have more than doubled and reached 11 thousand kilometers. In view of this, locomotives, wagons and rails have been renewed and secured. Many of these locomotives and wagons are manufactured by Iranian engineers and workers. Last year, transported nearly 25 million travelers and 47 million tons of loads. Furthermore, the Islamic Republic of Iran has 5800 kilometers of sea borders in the north and south of the country granting it a high privilege for the export and import of commodities via maritime routes. This shows the status of ports. In Shah's regime, the port cities had a capacity of just 10 million tons which were mainly used for importing of commodities from western countries. Today, however, there are many port cities on the Caspian Sea, Persian Gulf and he Sea of Oman which work with a capacity of nearly 220 million tons of transportation annually which is 22 times more than the figure in Pahlavi period. In 2017, 24 million people traveled by different vessels from Iranian ports. Presently, Iran has a huge fleet of ships and frigates and 125 thousand captains who have valid licenses for transferring travelers and goods. As for aerial transportation, Iran has 57 airports, none of which are international. 266 airplanes transport 34 million passengers annually; while, this number was just 25 airplanes. Unfortunately, the Islamic Republic has been under tough sanctions by western governments which refuse to sell planes to Iran. Thus, Iranian specialists embarked on the job and made small military aircrafts and they have planned to make the first indigenous airplane within five years with God's help.

Iran enjoys a great number of ancient monuments due to its very old history. Hence, it is among top 10 countries in this field. Plus, the beautiful and diverse nature of the country has turned the country into a very attractive destination for tourists and nature travelers. To this one should add the existence of religious and sacred places which make Iran as a haven of religious and faithful people from all over the world. therefore, more than 5 million foreign tourists and pilgrims travel to Iran every year to visit Iran's arresting places and monuments. This shows a 10 times increase compared with the pre-revolution period. Efforts have been made to provide the necessary infrastructures for improvement of this industry so that the number of hotels has more than quadrupled and got to 1200.

One of the benefits of foreign tourists and travelers coming to Iran is that they get closely familiar with the progresses, beauties, security and hospitable people in Iran and foil the ploys of the western media and politicians who try to demonize Iran and portray it as a backward, insecure and cultureless nation. Besides, the high number of health tourists indicates that the Islamic Republic is a successful and advanced country in various medical fields.

All these progresses have been made in spite of the fact that the enemies, especially the US, have done their best to strike the Islamic Republic and put the people in bottleneck. In view of this, Ayatollah Khamenei raised the issue of "Resistance Economy" to thwart the enemies' plans. The Leader said on the features of Resistance Economy, "A resistant economy should be resistant in its internal structure; should be able to stand and not to become turbulent with various changes here in there in the world."