Comraerce.—Persia was formerly a much more generally self supporting country than at present and produced almost all she needed, leaving a surplus of certain of her products for export.
Since the introduction of cheap machine-made articles, many of the home industries of Persia have languished and to-day Persia is dependent largely on external sources for the supply of many of her manufactured necessities, e.g., cotton goods and yarns, metal goods, machinery, etc. Among food commodities, largely imported, are tea and sugar. The principal exports of Persia are natural products : mineral oils, raw materials (cotton, silk, wool), fruits, opium, rice, skins and hides, gums and tobacco. Almost the only manufactured product exported by Persia is carpets. The principal centres of active trade are Tabriz, Tehran, Kerman shah, Resht, Shiraz, Kerman, Meshed and Duzdab; the chief ports are Pahlavi (EnAli), Bushire, Mohammerah, Abadan and Bandar Abbas.
The value (in thousands of krans) of Persia's foreign trade, including oil shipments and bullion and specie, for the fiscal years ending March 20, for which complete customs statistics are avail able, is as follows :— Excluding bullion and specie and oil shipments, the total trade of Persia amounted to 1,053,408 in 1913-14 (the year immedi ately preceding the War) and 1,340,969 in 1925-26.
It would be erroneous to regard this as necessarily indicating an increase in the volume of Persia's general trade, when the rise in prices is taken into consideration.
Table showing the Balance of Trade for the years 1925-26 and 1926-27 (in thousands of krans) Thus if bullion and specie and oil products are excluded there is an adverse balance of trade. This adverse merchandise balance amounted in showing in general a gradual downward tendency until 1925-26, when an upward tendency set in. It is probable, however, that Persian exports are under-valued as compared with imports, and that this adverse balance is largely fictitious.
Tables showing the principal Articles of Import and Export:— Two of the items of export call for special comment. Regard ing mineral oils, although Persia possesses enormous oil resources —this product forming from 50-6o% of her annual exports—the country nevertheless until recently supplied its needs almost entirely from Russia, as the diffi culties and cost of transport from S. W. Persia of this commodity
made it impossible to supply the markets of Central and N. Persia from Abadan. Energetic steps are now being taken by the Anglo-Persian Oil Co., with the benevolent assistance of the Per sian Government, to place its products on the market in N. and Central Persia in competi tion with those of Russia.
Next to oil production the manufacturing of carpets forms the most important of Persian industries, the export of this com modity constituting about i 1% of the total export trade. The value of carpets exported amounted in 1924-25 to 101,881,000 krans, 1925-26 to 117,581,000 krans and 1926-27 to 122,563,000 krans. Despite the apparent increase in the trade during the past three years, there are indications that this special industry of Persia is meeting with increasing competition from the Indian, Chinese, Armenian and Greek productions of a similar nature. The looms set up in Greece in particular, by Greek and Armenian weavers, expelled from Turkey after the Great War, are already making their influence felt.
Table showing the Principal Lines of Trade, into and out of Persia, in 1925-26:— Excluding Abadan (the trade of which consisted almost wholly of oil shipments), the total trade, by way of the Gulf ports was 186,000 tons, as compared with 221,000 tons through the ports of the Caspian sea. The Caspian Sea trade was entirely Russian; of the Persian Gulf trade, 70% was British, the bulk of the , remainder being Persian, German, and Japanese.