Gholam Mohammad Zare said the required infrastructure for development of petrochemical industries have been put down across the country which provides for a palatable opportunity for the private sector to invest and draw considerable revenues.
He further said there are key junctures in northern and southern parts of the country with enormous potentialities where pipelines for carrying petrochemical feedstock are being laid out.
He further added that the balanced growth of the petrochemical industry brings the country magnificent value added raising the national GDP level.
He stressed the fact that even if the western sanctions on Iran's industries remain in place, the petrochemical sector will be able to pursue its ambitions by timely investments of private sector in the upstream and downstream sectors of the industry.
Iran enjoys a 60-million-ton petrochemical production capacity, and due to a variety of reasons including feedstock shortage, only 68 percent of this capacity is used.
Four petrochemical hubs are to be established in Parsian Special Economic Zone in the east of Assaluyeh off Persian Gulf waters, Jask Free Zone off the Sea of Oman, Chabahar Free Zone and Iranshahr Special Zone in southeastern Iran.
Iran is determined to become the biggest petrochemical producer in the Middle East.
The country has significantly expanded the range and volume of its petrochemical production over the past few years, and the NPC has become the second largest producer and exporter of petrochemicals in the Middle East after Saudi Arabia.