TEHRAN (NIPNA) -- The director of planning and development of the National Petrochemical Company said the use of natural gas as feedstock to produce petrochemical products could triple value added generation in the industry, adding the figure could increase 10 times by completing the sector’s value chain.

AcHassan Abbaszadeh said: "The petrochemical industry is very important in the production chain of the oil industry by reducing crude sales and supplying valuable products from hydrocarbon sources."

The Planning and Development Director of the National Petrochemical Company noted the petrochemical industry’s roadmap, and stated: “The National Petrochemical Company is the architect, leader and policy-maker of the petrochemical industry development. Although development and investment in this sector is not currently carried out by the government, the National Petrochemical Company, in its leading role, encourages investors to bankroll projects in this industry.”

Abbaszadeh said: "The development of the recent roadmap, which has been done in the past year, is based on completing the value chain and diversifying the products of the petrochemical industry and reducing the import of petrochemical items.”

He added: "In the petrochemical industry roadmap, a total of 10 projects of the second leap projects still remain to be exploited and 40 projects in the form of the third leap project are among the projects that will be put into operation by 2025.”

This set of these 40 projects will increase Iran’s petrochemical production capacity from 100 million tons to 133 million tons, with a required investment of $20 billion, he argued.