Mohammad Masoud Sami-nejad stated according to the report of Farda Ekhtaz and quoted by the news managers: As long as there is a rent due to the mandated pricing, the private sector will not have much desire to enter the mining sector.
He considers the inconsistency between different institutions as well as the lack of attention to the mining sector in the Ministry of Mines to be the factors behind the current backwardness of the mining sector and believes that in order to revive the mining sector, we should move towards the separation of the Ministry of Mines and the separation of the commercial sector from the industry and mining sector.
According to the CEO of Parsian Investment Group, more than ninety percent of the things we deal with in our lives are related to mining, and despite this, there is no serious attention to this field among the general public and the officials. What has caused us to neglect the field of mining?
He continued: We are the first in the mining sector in the region and our reserves are very significant from the point of view of diversity. The countries of the region may be leaders in gas-related mines, but they do not have mineral soil, or they may have mineral soil, but they do not have gas. There is this potential in our country that we have both the energy needed to extract mines and minerals in our country.
Samiinejad added: Minerals exist in raw form in our country, and what we should pay attention to is the mining process. Ever since our Ministry of Mines and Metals became a subsidiary of four other ministries, the attention that should have been given to the mining sector among the officials has automatically decreased and this was due to the serious attention that the Minister of Industry, Mining and Trade should have paid to the people’s livelihood areas. And the spontaneous demands of the people in this field made the minister focus more on the trade sector and the mine was placed on the sidelines.
He pointed out: What is clear is that the legislators and officials pay a lot of attention to the mining sector, and for this sector, they have considered a growth of about thirteen percent in the plan. Are these expectations compatible with the attention paid to the mining sector?
The CEO of Parsian Investment Group said: What is clear is that the Ministry of Security alone cannot do anything to realize this plan. In order to achieve a growth of 13%, several agencies and ministries should be placed next to the Ministry of Security and activated. We must note that the mining sector plays an essential role in people’s livelihood in a subtle way. Ninety-five percent of a building is made of mineral products, and in order to improve the livelihood of our people, we must pay attention to the development of the infrastructure of the mining sector.
According to him, after the merger of the ministries, because the power of the mining sector was lost, the executive bodies such as the institutions in charge of electricity, water, transportation, etc., which should have been placed next to the mining sector, did not fulfill their duties, and this made us unable to develop. Let’s advance the mining sector well.
What was Imidro’s role in this?
Sami Nejad stated: I think the government’s view of Imidro is in the shape of a piggy bank. In the sense that they expect Imidro to make money and pour it into the government fund, and there is no development view of Imidro. We must admit that the development of the mining sector in Iran was related to the time when a strong minister centrally managed the mining sector. All our important mining industries came into existence at that time.
According to him, we are currently in trouble in terms of energy balance in the steel industry, and unfortunately, our companies have neither electricity nor gas for four months a year, even though we have given these companies a production license and we are obliged to provide the necessary infrastructure for production. But because the permit was provided outside the regulations, the balance has been disturbed.
The CEO of Parsian Investment Group emphasized: The first thing that should be done is for Imidro to return to its original mission and in line with the 7th plan for Imidro’s subsidiary companies to plan so that we can control the energy imbalance in the least possible way and then we can use the help of other devices. Let’s focus on development programs. We must know that the Ministry of Industry and Mines alone cannot achieve growth and development. The most obvious example is that we have exports in the mining sector, but the currency resulting from this export is not in our hands so that we can exploit it for development.
He said that in the Ministry of Oil, the problem of receiving export currency up to fourteen percent has been solved with measures. Can’t we follow the same path in the ministry of privacy? He clarified: To go in this direction, the dear ones who are at the top of the work should revise the mining law. When I was the vice president of mining, the first steps were taken in this direction, but along the way, we encountered weaknesses and in the end, we could not shape the law well. We have a single window called the mining section, where the tasks of all executive devices are well defined in this window, but these tasks are not executed well.
Sami Nejad noted: We must revise the law so that the devices adjacent to the mining sector stand by this sector. If this happens, it will be possible to solve the problems and the problem you mentioned will also be solved.
According to him, one of our most important issues in the mining sector is that mining areas have been assigned for exploration, but exploration is not carried out in them. In such a situation, if we can provide the necessary capital for exploration in the mining sector, is there a mine for exploration?
CEO of Parsian Investment Group stating that the mining law is for areas where no work is done; It has been defined, he said: that means they should take the points and put them to auction and give them away again. If we do not implement the law correctly, it is not a weakness of the law. When I was the vice president of mining, we were active in this field. According to the survey conducted at that time, sixty-eight percent of the mines were given to women. We entered this field and managed it to some extent, but the process has not progressed well.
He pointed out: One of our problems in this sector is that we do not use neighboring specialized organizations such as the mining engineering system properly. We can make good use of these organizations in the discussion of monitoring and evaluating eligibility for handing over. The problems of the mining sector have nothing to do with sanctions. In the last few years, we have been able to update ourselves in the field of mining processing technology, and this shows that the problems of the mining sector are mostly in the dimension of expertise and coordination between the devices.
Samiinejad added: On the day when we were inaugurating the pellet production of Parsian Investment Company, I told the first vice president who came to inaugurate the project that four hundred and twenty workshops have been working to achieve this technology that foreigners had abandoned, and we were able to do so in this field. become self-sufficient Maybe currently the cost for us in this approach is more than import, but little by little we can reduce the costs. There, I asked the first deputy not to give pellet making plans to foreigners in order to make pellet making in Iran economical and reduce the cost. Six months later, they gave two plans to foreigners, which is still half and half!
Pointing out that where do we want to go in the mining sector with this mismanagement, he emphasized: One of our basic problems is the lack of a strategy. When I went to the vice president of mining, there were some strategy books in the library. I called one of the general managers and asked him where we are in these strategies. He said to leave these. These are just written. We have a written strategy, but the fact that we have not been able to act strategically is due to the decision-making power that is not seen in the mining sector.
The CEO of Parsian Investment Group by stating whether the mining sector should be separated from the Ministry of Security? The Supreme Leader said, “We have failed in the mining sector” and they were right. Mining is lost in the Ministry of Industry, Mines and Trade. The Minister of Peace must think about the price of cars and tea and regulate the market, and any minister who is placed in this ministry will not think about the development of mines until the people’s stomachs are in trouble.
He added: We have to go in the direction where the attention to the mining sector becomes real, and this is possible by separating the industry and mining sector from the commercial sector. If this does not happen, the Ministry of Security must be able to coordinate the five ministries in the government under a single economic command, which is usually the first vice president, for the development of the mining sector, otherwise nothing will happen. We should note that the productivity in the mining sector has decreased and a major part of this is due to the subsidies provided in the field of gas and electricity, etc.
Sami Nejad stated: I believe that the subsidy makes management unproductive and we should think about this issue. Subsidies should be removed and mandatory pricing in the mining sector should be resolved. If supply and demand become the pricing criteria in the mining sector, violations caused by rents will be reduced. In the case of Mobarakeh steel factory, it is said that the difference between the factory price and the market price was 57 thousand billion tomans. From this difference in price, the builder of the tower will benefit more, or the house of Mehr? We can give a special formula seal for housing. For example, let’s say to the factory, give 20% of your product at the approved price to Maksan Mehr, and we will give you a 20% subsidy instead. What else is the need for command pricing? By creating the ground for rent, we have lowered the productivity of managers and left the space to non-specialist managers.
He emphasized: The excuse for not touching the mandatory pricing is the fear of its social effect and its impact on people’s pockets. Ordinary people who want to build a building eventually need a round shaft trolley, which they buy from the open market at a real price. Someone who does not come to the commodity exchange to buy an iron trailer. In the end, the person who benefits from this price rent is a mass producer.
The CEO of Parsian Investment Group stated: We cannot talk about the real private sector in the field of mining. Our mines are either government or private. Currently, there is a powerful private sector that has invested in the mining industry and has always been neglected. As long as the private sector grows, stonewalling starts in front of it, and the question becomes why this private company has grown.
According to him, unfortunately, opinions are closed in the mining sector. Moreover, when the rent is removed from the mining sector, the real private sector will find the space to enter this sector. As long as the situation is like this and the pricing is mandated, there is no possibility of attracting foreign investors and there is no economic logic for the serious entry of the private sector into this sector. We sell it for one hundred and sixty dollars. Suddenly, the global sale was stopped, and then when it was possible to sell it again, no one would buy it from us at the price of seventy-five dollars. Why should the national capital be wasted like this due to a wrong thinking? Despite such thoughts, how can foreign investors be attracted?
Emphasizing that exports need long-term planning, Sami Nejad noted: When any manager can completely change export policies, is such planning possible? We hope that in the 14th government, we can amend the laws in such a way that long-term investment is possible. If there is a certainty that the rules will not change with the change of management, the investor will enter the market.
Regarding the approach of Parsian Investment Company in this situation, he said: In the next few years, we will face a crisis regarding the supply of raw materials for the steel industry, and on this basis, I found it necessary to take a step to eliminate the steel chain in the country, from mining to raw materials for smelting in We invested in Parsian subsidiary companies. Currently, four thousand people are working directly in our companies, and we have finished the half-finished government projects and listed the companies.
CEO of Parsian Investment Group added: Currently, our capital is about 80% and this success has been achieved in about eight years. This work has been done in a failed structure, and maybe if it was not for the failed structure, our development would be twice the current situation. If the structure is correct and the process of supply and demand is formed correctly, various problems such as electricity imbalance will be solved. Why is the private sector not going to create a power plant now? Because in the end, he has to sell his electricity with a subsidy.
He clarified about the first and most urgent decision to be made in Imidro: the first step is to review Imidro’s goals to recognize the weaknesses that have led to Imidro’s dissatisfaction. The second step is to return Imidro to the development track and remove the piggy bank view of Imidro.
Sami Nejad stated about the Tabas mine incident: The problem of Tabas mine was in the field of safety and this matter has nothing to do with issues like sanctions. Coal mines are gas mines. Failure to pay attention to the proper ventilation of gases, lack of attention to safety monitoring, the problem of power outages in mines, etc. are among the issues that cause such accidents. Currently, mines prefer to give contracts to contractors for extraction in volume form, and the desire of contractors to extract as much as possible affects the attention to safety. The Ministry of Labor is responsible for the safety and supervision of this sector.
