Gilan governor: essential goods keep flowing through northern routes, the Caspian and rail and road borders

Hadi Haghshenas, governor of Gilan province, said on Saturday, 25 July 2026, that Iran is continuing to supply essential goods by drawing on northern capacity including the Caspian Sea and its rail and road borders, and that the country cannot be blockaded.

He made the remarks with reference to the constraints imposed on the country's southern maritime routes. The ports of Anzali, Caspian and Astara in Gilan province, together with the Astara rail crossing into Azerbaijan, are among the entry points for grain and animal feed imports from Russia and Kazakhstan.

The share of the northern corridor in Iran's trade matters for the market in essential goods and for inflation expectations. Even so, the capacity of the Caspian ports and the northern rail network is smaller than that of the southern ports, and shifting import volumes onto these routes runs into infrastructure bottlenecks.