Exports of steel by ten major producers in Iran hit 4.049 million tons in the first seven months of the current Iranian calendar year (March 21-October 22), up eight percent compared to the same period of time in the past year, IRNA reported on Wednesday.

“Industry ministry is planning to increase the exports of steel products to 12 million tons by the end of the current year [March 19, 2020],” according to deputy industry, mining and trade minister.

The value of the exports of such commodities is expected to reach $9 billion by the yearend, Jafar Sarqini has previously announced.

Iran plans to reach steel production of 55 million tons by the Iranian calendar year of 1404 (March 2025-March 2026), of which about 40 percent is planned to be exported.

Iranian industry, mining and trade minister said on Monday that the country holds a 62-percent share of the Middle East’s total crude steel production and it is planning to further increase this share.

Reza Rahmani said that Iran has reached a balanced steel production chain in which all stages of production including engineering, implementation, fabrication and operation are being executed by Iranian experts and with domestic knowledge and technology.

Iran’s steel production has been growing well over the past few years and the country rose from 13th to 10th place in the list of the world’s top steel producers in World Steel Association (WSA)’s latest ranking, he said.

In late January, WSA announced that Iran ranked 10th among crude steel producers in the world in 2018 with 25 million tons of production.

Iran has pushed aside Italy, Taiwan and Ukraine to become the 10th biggest producer of crude steel in the world for the year 2018.

The WSA has put the global crude steel production for the year 2018 at 1.808 billion tons, which shows a 4.6 percent increase compared to 2017.

According to the report, Iran’s crude steel industry has remained in good shape despite the U.S. sanctions.

Iran’s share of global crude steel production was estimated at 1.38 percent for the year 2018. /T.T/

Behdokht Valian has won the Best Actress Award for her role in the Iranian short film ‘Tattoo’ from the 37th Sulmona International Film Festival (SIFF), held in Italy, November 6-9.

Directed by Farhad Delaram, ‘Tattoo’ is about a young girl who wants to renew her driver’s license but she is sent to the traffic police center for her tattoos.
A 2019 production, the 15-minute-long film has won several awards earlier this year.
It won the Golden Owl for best short film at the 19th Tirana International Film Festival, Albania’s Academy Awards short films qualifying event, and the Crystal Bear for best short in the Generation 14plus section of the 69th Berlin International Film Festival.
Besides Valian in the leading role, Alireza Sanifar, Anahita Eghbalnejad, Mojtaba Fallahi and Pouria Shakibaei play in the film.
The SIFF is a festival for short films taking place in Sulmona, Italy. it celebrates young cinema from all around the world with a selection of new works from emerging directors and passionate storytellers with unique visions.
The event also presents a range of special initiatives included film workshop, retrospectives, non-competitive feature films screening, concerts and exhibitions. / MNA/

The Iranian junior Kabaddi team has gained a commanding win over Malaysia at the first-ever junior Kabbadi world cup underway on the Iranian Kish Island.

The last match of the first stage of Junior Kabaddi World Cup was held on Wednesday afternoon between Iran and Malaysia and it ended with a 70-29 win for the host country Iran.

With that commanding victory, the Iranian junior team advanced to the quarterfinals against Taiwan tomorrow.

The First-ever Junior Kabaddi World Cup kicked off on 9th November, 2019 in Kish Island, Iran, organized by the International Kabaddi Federation (IKF).

Iran, Thailand, Pakistan, Denmark, Bangladesh, China Taipei, Kina and Sri Lanka are teams that will compete in the knock-out stage of quarterfinals on Thursday. / MNA/

The science and technology companies of Iran and China signed seven memorandums of understanding on Wednesday in the Chinese city of Shenzhen.

During a ceremony with Iran’s Vice President for Science and Technology Sorena Sattari in attendance in the city of Shenzhen, in southern China on Wednesday, knowledge-based and scientific companies of Iran and China signed seven memoranda of understanding.

Representatives of over 70 representatives of knowledge-based companies are accompanying VP Sattari on the visit to China, who are in China to attend the China International Import Expo (CIIE) in Shanghai.

Among others, a MoU between Iran Nano company and two Chinese companies was signed.

On the sidelines of the signing ceremony of the agreements, Sattari said that 21st China International High-tech Fair in Shenzhen provides good opportunities to Iranian firms.

The Iranian delegation arrived in the Chinese technology hub of Shenzhen on Tuesday at the invitation of the Chinese Minister of Science and Technology Wang Zhigang to promote cooperation between the two countries’ creative and knowledge-based companies.

The Iranian vice president is also planned to hold talks with Chinese scientific officials during the visit.

The 70 Iranian firms that are accompanying Sattari are active and operating in the fields of information technology, stem cells, industrial machinery and equipment, advanced materials, as well as the field of health. /MNA/

Iranian director Alireza Motamedi’s film “Reza” was crowned best in the official section of the 7th Asian Film Festival Barcelona (AFFBCN) in the Spanish city on Sunday.

The film tells the story of a divorced man named Reza who is trying to adapt to his new life after a divorce while he finds a new romance.

Iranian director Shahram Mokri received the best director award for his film “Invasion” in the Discoveries section, while the screenplay award in the Panorama section went to Iranian writer and director Ruhollah Hejazi for his movie “The Dark Room”.

“Invasion” is about Saman who has been murdered and the police are investigating in a club, the scene of the crime. They have arrested Ali as the murder suspect and are trying to uncover the method used in the murder. However, the case becomes quite complicated and the friends of the murdered person are not very cooperative.

“The Dark Room” is about Haleh and Farhad, who together with their 5-year-old son, Amir, have recently moved into a new complex. Amir is lost in the desert in front of the complex, however, his parents quickly find him. Later, Amir tells his father that someone has seen his body and this makes Farhad very upset, so he goes looking for a suspect who has sexually abused his little boy.

A lineup of 14 Iranian films, including “Orduckly” by Behruz Gharibpur, “Pastarioni” by Soheil Movaffaq, “Sheeple” by Hooman Seyyedi, “First Autograph for Rana” by Ali Zhakan and “Footwork” by Mazdak Mirabedini, were also screened in the various sections of the festival.

“Wild Jonquils” by Rahbar Qanbari, “Divorce Me Because of the Cats” by Mohammad-Ali Sajjadi, “Here” by Hadi Mohaqqeq, “Yeva” by Anahid Abad, “Astigmatism” by Majidreza Mostafavi and “Orange Days” by Arash Lahuti were also among the films. /T.T/

The Islamic Republic of Iran is ranked at the first place among the West Asian countries in terms of the number of papers in the field of artificial intelligence (AI) in 2018, according to data released by SCImago Journal.

With 1,813 papers, Iran took first place among other countries in the region in the field of AI research in 2018, followed by Turkey with 1,678 researches, the data analysis shows.

Of the total 1,813 papers, some 1,672 were citable documents.

Based on the information gained from 1997 until 2017, Iran submitted 34,028 articles about AI and its usage, ranking it at the 14th place in the world in the area of artificial intelligence.

Iran is the 8th country in the world based on high impact and high citation articles and the only country from the Middle East in the top ten countries in this field.

Iran has submitted 1.3 percent of the high citation articles in the field of artificial intelligence and also 0.02 percent of the hot articles.

The country has also published 271 highly cited papers and 5 hot papers, making it one of the best countries in this field.

Half of the highly cited papers submitted by Iran have been conducted with the help of researchers from other countries, but only 0.74 percent of them are the result of collaborating with the industry sector. /MNA/

As many as 140 films from 25 countries are taking part at the 36th Tehran International Short Film Festival, which opened in the Iranian capital on Saturday, according to the event’s organizers.

Director of 36th Tehran International Short Film Festival, Sadegh Mousavi, said 140 short documentary, experimental and animated films from 25 countries including Spain, France, Germany, USA, Russia, Czech Republic, Switzerland, The Netherlands, China, India, Belgium, Nepal, Slovenia, Singapore, Japan, Peru, Lithonia, Turkey, Luxemburg, Croatia, Serbia, Malta are taking part at the event.

Jury members form New Zealand, India, Portugal, Belgium and Iran will judge the films in the national and international sections of the event.

He added the festival is thirty-six years old, while 80% of the world’s festivals are less than 10 years old.

Mousavi noted that several seminars and workshops are slated to be held attended by foreign guests.

“Some 1648 works were sent to the secretariat in the national section and less than 10%, 140 works, were handpicked for the festival lineup,” he added.

The festival will be screening films simultaneously in several Iranian provinces including Boshehr, Southern Khorasan, Ilam, Hormuzgan, Maznadaran, Eastern Azerbaijan, Qom and Khozestan.

The 36th Tehran International Short Film Festival will wrap up on November 15 . /MNA/

Head of Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) Ali Akbar Salehi announced on Sunday that Iran will produce up to 3,000 megawatts of nuclear electricity by 2027, which will avert emission of 21 million tons of pollutant gases.

Making the remarks during the ceremony to start laying the concrete foundations of the second unit of Bushehr nuclear power plant, the AEOI chief added that Bushehr plant will help the country save $660 million per year.

Describing that each nuclear power plant can stay online for about 60 years and more, Salehi added that each plant costs $5 billion and can return its initial construction costs in six years after becoming operational.

The Iranian official also informed that Bushehr plant, which is safe and secure, can provide local residents with 200,000 to 400,000 cubic meters of potable water in the future.

Concrete placement in foundations of the second unit of Bushehr nuclear power plant kicked off on Sunday in the presence of Salhi, some Iranian officials and the President of ASE Group of Companies of the Russian Federation’s power equipment and service exporter, Atomstroyexport, Alexander Lokshin.

On November 2, the IAEO chief underscored that Iran will continue its discovery and extraction plans powerfully and that under JCPOA, the country had not abdicated its rights but had only accepted time and numerical restrictions.

As previously reported, the second unit of the Bushehr nuclear power plant is scheduled to come on stream in 6 years, while the third unit will be finished in 8 years.

The 2nd and 3rd units of the Bushehr plant will increase the share of nuclear power in Iran’s electricity supply to amounts well beyond the current 2.7 percent.

In November 2014, the Nuclear Power Production and Development Company of Iran (NPPD) and Russia’s Atomstroiexport signed two contracts to work on parts of the 2nd and 3rd units.

A total of $10 billion has been allocated for the construction of the two units.

The capacity of the second phase is expected to stand above 1,000 megawatts (MW). The total capacity of the two units of WWER-1,000 (Water-Water Energetic Reactor) will be 2,100 megawatts. / MNA/

Tehran Stock Exchange (TSE) signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Shanghai Stock Exchange (SSE) for expansion of mutual cooperation, IRNA reported on Monday.

According to TSE office of public relations, the MOU was signed in Shanghai during the visit of an Iranian delegation to China on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China.

Based on the MOU, the two sides will be able to exchange information and experience, hold training courses and cooperate in foreign investment areas, design products including various types of funds and securities, develop trading and regulatory infrastructure, upgrade corporate governance structure, and also carry out joint study projects in accordance with the laws of both markets.

Also, after the signing ceremony of the cooperation document, at the invitation of China Government Securities Depository Trust & Clearing Company (CSDC), a meeting was held with the officials of the company, during which they presented a report to the Iranian delegation on the capabilities and mechanisms and announced their readiness for cooperation with the Iranian capital market.

Located in the city of Shanghai, SSE is one of the two stock exchanges operating independently in China, the other is Shenzhen Stock Exchange.
Shanghai Stock Exchange is the world’s 4th largest stock market after New York, NASDAQ and Japan Exchange Group by market capitalization at $4.5 trillion as of October 2019./ T.T/