Iran has announced 100 outstanding small and medium-sized enterprises following the country’s first coordinated national evaluation exercise involving key industry and standards agencies.
The programme, held in Tehran, brought together the Industrial Management Organization (IMO), the National Standards Organization and several development bodies. The assessment was based on models developed by the IMO to identify high-performing SMEs.
A public call for entries was issued in June, allowing businesses to register on a dedicated platform. Evaluation teams conducted site visits, reviewed evidence and submitted scores, which were later validated by the programme secretariat before the final list was released.
Speaking at the event, Qasem Khorrami, head of the Industrial Management Organization, said small industries remain the backbone of Iran’s industrial development. He explained that SME importance had been recognised as far back as 1956 during the drafting of Iran’s second seven-year development plan.
Khorrami added that the Iranian Small Industries and Industrial Parks Organization (ISIPO) was initially created under the Ministry of Economy after recommendations from the IMO, before later moving to the Ministry of Industry, Mine and Trade in 1981.
He noted that modern small industry development goes beyond serving as scaled-down versions of large factories. Instead, it is defined by workforce size and global development principles that emphasise fairness, poverty reduction and shared economic growth.
Khorrami said that although SME development did not always receive consistent attention historically, it regained prominence during the formulation of the second seven-year plan, alongside early proposals for establishing Iran’s first development bank.
