Iran temporarily suspends 10% fees on foreign energy carriers

The Iranian government has temporarily suspended, under an order issued last Thursday by Vice President for Legal Affairs Majid Ansari, a 10% fee on foreign vessels carrying oil, gas and liquid petroleum products to and from Iran. The move aims to ease logistics costs and support energy exports amid rising insurance and maritime shipping costs.

The decision followed a request from the secretariat of the Business Support Committee affiliated with the Iran Chamber of Commerce, and was prompted by the conditions facing the domestic maritime fleet and the need to support Iranian product exports. The suspension will remain in place until a list of covered entities requiring Cabinet approval is adopted.

Lower export costs

Fereydoun Asadi, secretary of Iran’s Association of Oil, Gas and Petrochemical Product Exporters, said during the 104th meeting of the Business Support Committee held last month that collection of the fee dated back to 2008, when conditions in the country were less complex. He called for decisions linked to normal conditions not to be applied in the current circumstances.

Geoeconomic researcher Mehdi Arab Sadegh said the suspension of the 10% fee was part of Tehran’s efforts to restructure spending during the military confrontation. He noted that the Strait of Hormuz, through which about 25% of global seaborne oil trade and about 20% of liquefied natural gas once passed, had become a bottleneck, with traffic falling to just 7 tankers on some days. Regional crude oil exports have also nearly halved in recent months.

But Arab Sadegh played down the decision’s ability to address broader pressures, explaining that a reduction equivalent to 10% of freight charges remained limited in the face of banking sanctions, restrictions on access to the international financial system and the difficulty of repatriating export revenues through banking channels. He warned that the prolonged closure of Iranian oil wells and fields could cause lasting damage to the country’s production capacity.

Limited impact on citizens

Arab Sadegh ruled out a direct impact on Iranian consumers, saying domestic fuel prices remain government-controlled and are not linked to global transportation costs. The indirect economic impact could emerge through support for exports and hard-currency inflows if lower costs help foreign carriers continue operating.

Majid Zowari, director of the Institute of International Relations, said suspending the fees could reduce logistics costs for energy exports and encourage foreign vessels to carry them after a number of Iranian carriers were damaged. He added that maintaining the fees under current conditions weakened the competitiveness of Iranian exporters, while suspending them gave exporters greater flexibility in choosing their shipping fleet.

Zowari said the decision might not deliver quick benefits to citizens, as continued US maritime pressure would keep weighing on the exchange rate and the value of the national currency, raising import costs, reducing jobs linked to maritime trade and hindering the return of the country’s hard-currency revenues. He also said the measure did not alter the maritime security equation or offset the cost of confrontations involving tankers.

Navigation risks limit the decision’s effectiveness

Fereydoun Majlesi, a former Iranian diplomat, said suspending the fees would not be enough to encourage vessels to risk reaching Iranian shores amid the continuing war and lack of maritime security. He ruled out the decision alone leading to increased hard-currency inflows into Tehran.

Majlesi added that the priority was to end the chronic state of war, saying its continuation undermined freedom of navigation in the regional waterways on which global energy trade depends. Reducing tensions, he said, required a regional political initiative addressing the roots of the crisis, rather than partial economic measures alone.