Radio Nigeria Correspondent reports from Terran, that the Iranian Steel Industry is aiming high as it intends to step-up its production from five point two to seven point two million metric tonnes in the next one year.

An Iranian expert in steel development, Mr. Rasool Mehmandoost, on Tuesday, offered suggestions to Nigeria on how best to revive her ailing steel industry.

Mehmandoost advised Nigeria to avoid the pitfall of selling its raw materials, adding that the government and the private sector must collaborate to develop the sector.

He told a delegation of Nigerian journalists on a working visit to the Esfahan Mobarakeh Steel Company, that Iran had made a success of its venture into steel production largely due to collaboration.

Mehmandoost, who is the company’s interpreter/Public Relations Officer, also said the place of manpower development could not be over-emphasized.

He explained that company was built in the early 1980s and was initially sustained through public funding but was later privatized and was now running at a profit.

Although it had some challenges during the eight-year long Iran-Iraq war, the company is currently the largest iron industry in the Middle East with an annual production capacity of 5.2 million tonnes of steel.

He added, “The management of this company, as it changed over the years, has been careful to study and incorporate various successful management standards used in other countries.

The expert observed that international sanctions had not impacted seriously on the expansion and modernisation of the facility because 90 per cent of the equipment and machinery used in the plant were produced locally.