As reported by the Department of Public Relations, Organization for Investment, Economic and Technical Assistance of Iran, Behrouz Alishiri talking in the meeting for presenting the UNCTAD report on foreign direct investment trend in different countries, held on Thursday with the attendance of first deputy of president, minister of economic affairs and finance, governors of provinces, deputy ministers of economic affairs and some members of parliament, added: Iran achieved the record of 86% growth in foreign direct investment attraction, while the average FDI, following various economic and financial crises, had a 37% drop.
Alishiri, referring to the 20th UNCTAD report on FDI in different countries, said: Iran, Cyprus and Qatar are the only countries who had constant FDI growth within the last three years.
He added: the average FDI attraction in Iran in the course of 1995 to 2005 was 1.251 billion dollars, reaching 1.6 in 2006, 1.670 billion in 2007, 1.615 billion in 2008 and in 2009 the record was broken by attraction of 3 billion dollars of foreign direct investment to the country.
President of Organization for Investment, Economic and Technical Assistance of Iran continued  by saying that reduction of FDI across the world, influenced investment attraction in developing countries and added: the foreign direct investment trend to Malaysia had a negative growth of 81%, being minus 58% for Turkey.
Alishiri pointed out: Notwithstanding economic crises and reduction of FDI all over the world, about 20 countries experienced FDI growth including Luxemburg, Denmark, Qatar, Switzerland, Iran and Italy. Islamic Republic of Iran stands the sixth among them.
HE continued by stipulating that If we are to attract foreign direct investment, it is needed to open agencies and representative offices in the target markets to that aim.
Based on our correspondence, Alishiri concluded by saying: foreign direct investment has direct influence on reducing the rate of interest, reducing the rate of foreign currency, increasing economic growth rate, more tax revenues, reduction of government debts and improving income distribution.
In this ceremony, Seyed Shamseddin Hosseini, Minister of Economic Affairs and Finance, stressing foreign direct investment to the country said: to achieve 8% economic growth, we can’t merely rely on domestic resources.
Saying that, based on UNCTAD report, 92% of accumulative investments to the country went to oil, gas and industry, he stressed on enhancing other sectors for attracting FDI.
He regarded providing financial facilities among the most important problems of the country and added: Iran enjoys high levels of human and natural resources which need to be coordinated and put in line with financial resources.
Hosseini assessed positive what the governors of provinces have done and added: in line with the national potentials, local capacities  should be employed to increase operations.
Minister of Economic Affairs and Finance concluded by saying: Local bodies and governors have done more than the public bodies to attract FDI, the issue which needs to be enhanced in administrative departments.
In this ceremony, Mohammad Reza Rahimi, First Deputy of the President declared that a model has been drawn up, which needs to be approved by the Supreme Administrative Council, to reduce time and bureaucracy of FDI to the country, and added: based on this procedure, the bureaucracy of FDI will shorten to two weeks.
  Based on the report, at the end of the ceremony, some rewards were given to the best-practice governors and the presidents of Organizations for Economic Affairs and Finance of provinces for FDI attraction.
It should be noted the World Investment Report (WIR), published today across the world, is published annually by The United Nation Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) .