The Taliban which took over the state of affairs in Afghanistan in August has asked Iran to restart the export of dry fruits, a major revenue source via their India-developed Chabahar port.
Iran’s Tasnim News is reporting that Tehran is in the process of evaluating the Taliban’s proposals for allowing the transit of Afghanistan’s trade cargoes and export of fresh and dried fruits to India via the Chabahar route.
Representatives of both countries signed a comprehensive trade agreement last week as the Taliban submitted the detailed plan wherein Iran and the Taliban agreed to maintain round-the-clock operations at the Islam Qala-Dogarun border crossing and develop the land routes at the border crossing.
As of now, Iran has only agreed in principle to allow Afghan traders to export fresh and dried fruits to India which is one of the most important sources of revenue as Afghanistan has witnessed a bumper dry fruit harvest this year.
But now the cash-strapped Taliban which controls Afghanistan is in a bind because when they took power they had banned the export and imports to India, but now they are forced to rethink their stand due to mounting economic pressure because India imports around 85 per cent of its dry fruits from Afghanistan.
The sale of dry fruits sees a massive upward trend in September, just before the beginning of the festival seasons of Durga Puja and Diwali as Indians consume dried raisins, walnuts, almonds, figs, pine nuts, pistachios, dried apricot and fresh fruits such as apricot, cherry, watermelon, and a few medicinal herbs.
In the previous Afghan regime, fresh fruits were transported to India from Afghanistan via the air cargo corridor, which was stopped due to political uncertainty. Now the Afghan traders have to rely on the country’s Torkham and Chaman borders routes to the Wagah border via Pakistan, but it takes a lot of time and perishable items such as fresh fruits can go bad.
Also, the land route depends on the whim of Pakistani authorities who are known for asking bribe money for allowing the trucks to cross the border as hundreds of tonnes of bumper fruit crops remained stranded at the border crossing points with Pakistan for eventual exports for weeks and finally got rotten.
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