Indonesia says would study any barter approach from Iran
Posted by Labels: Indonesia, Iran, Trade AgreementsIndonesia, the world's top palm oil producer, would study any approach by Iran to trade by barter, it said on Friday, as tightening sanctions hurt Iran's ability to pay for basic staples.
Western financial sanctions have crimped Iran's purchases of grain, cooking oil and tea, and barter could provide one way to resume shipments.
Iran may turn to countries that have large Muslim populations and resources, such as Indonesia and Malaysia, for its needs.
Commodities traders have told Reuters Iran is offering gold bullion in overseas vaults or tankerloads of oil to secure food for its 74 million people, but could not give specific details on deals.
Barter deals are often between governments rather than companies.
Indonesian Trade Minister Gita Wirjawan said the government would consider proposals but had not received any overtures from Iran.
Trade officials said such deals have proved troublesome in the past.
"We have not got barter trade proposals from the Iranian government so far.
If they really want to have barter trade with Indonesia and ask us to do so, then we have to study it first before doing the barter," Wirjawan told reporters, adding if any barter trade was discussed gas would be preferable to oil.
New sanctions imposed by the United States and European Union to punish Iran for its nuclear programme do not bar firms from selling Iran food but they make it difficult to carry out the international financial transactions needed to pay for it.
Iran has not approached Malaysia for barter deals to keep its palm oil supplies flowing, two Malaysian government sources told Reuters on Friday, after traders said the country has stopped shipping the vegetable oil to Iran this year.
One said Malaysia is no longer keen to do barter trades after facing problems in a deal with North Korea in 2009 when $20 million worth of palm oil was to be exchanged for cash and fertiliser components.
"No matter how you do it, these countries don't have enough to barter.
So Malaysia is not going to do barter trades for the time being," said the source, who had direct knowledge of the matter.
Malaysia is the world's number two palm oil producer.
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