The Role of Southern Khorasan' Economic Geography in the Appearance of Iran' Eastern Economy Idea (With Emphasis on Afghanistan)

Afghanistan's tenacity in the eastern Iranian Economy has been the re-emergence of the eastern provinces in the country's foreign trade over the past one and a half decades. In the eastern economy, provinces like Sistan and Baluchistan, Kerman, South Khorasan, Razavi Khorasan and North Khorasan. This research aims at to examine the position of South Khorasan in the eastern Iranian economy, by the theoretical framework of economic geography. In fact, the aim of this study is to consider the economic status of the provinces and eastern parts of Iran in the economic development and regional trade plans. Considering regional geoeconomic and geopolitical competitions in Asia and global events such as the new US sanctions, the second aim of this research is to explore the economic position of the eastern countries of Iran in economic development and regional foreign trade planning. Researchers in the fields of economics, geography and politics have not paid attention to these issues.  Therefore, the main importance of the research is the attention to the significant role of South Khorasan and Afghanistan in Iran's economy, and explicating it within the framework of the new concept of the Eastern Economy. "Iran's Eastern Economy" is the new concept of this study to emphasize on the geoeconomic importance of eastern countries and provinces in the development of national economy and foreign trade of Iran. Geography of Central Asia, South Asia, Southeast Asia and East Asia are central areas of Iran's eastern economy. In this article, only Afghanistan is concerned.

The main question of this article is as follows: What are the environmental abilities of South Khorasan to expand Iran-Afghanistan economic relations? It should be said that cultural commonality and the most common border with Afghanistan, besides having border markets, proper security, and geopolitical and geostrategic status, are among the effective capabilities of the province to promote the commercial relations of the two countries. The significance of the present paper is to give an overwhelming and a transnational role to South Khorasan.

Review of Literature

Our theoretical framework is the economic geography. Economic geography is a branch of human geography that has been in place since the early twentieth century as an independent branch of geography. Subsequently, an important part of the geography was devoted to population, geography, agricultural geography, industrial geography, business geography and commerce. Scholars believe that understanding the geographic space that is influenced by human actions is mainly done through the study of economic geography, because the formation of geographic space and its consequences can be influenced by the demands for human productivity from the environment. Productivity could not be out of the reach of economic, geographical subdivisions because the subject under consideration was economic geography, forms of production, and places of consumption of all kinds of products at different levels. Therefore, most of the geographical implications of today are focused on the trades and power of different global, regional and national economic systems.

The authors of the paper have attempted to provide an overall analysis and evaluation of the content of the studies that are relevant to our discussion. A number of studies have focused on issues and micro levels of the South Khorasan economy, such as industry, markets, households, tourism, and local development. Others have focused solely on the economic capabilities of South Khorasan. The emphasis of this paper is on the transnational role and importance of the regional level of this province. Of course, the starting point for analyzing this research, like other studies, is the level of local abilities, but unlike them, it provides transnational results. Also, this research in the context of non-economic, political economy, while linking politics and economics, seeks to link these two areas with geography, security and culture.

The method of analyzing the data in this paper is the causal method. In this method, the results and consequences of research data are important. Therefore, by expressing and describing the capacities of South Khorasan, they analyze their role in Iran-Afghanistan trade interactions. Afterwards, among the techniques of observation, questionnaires, interviews and data collection libraries, the recent tools such as librarianship have been used.

The main issue of this research was to study the role of the economic geography of South Khorasan on economic relations between Iran and Afghanistan. The purpose of this issue was to focus on the area of ​​the "Eastern Regional Economy". Current and recent events in the region and the world indicate the instability of Iran's relations with the West, especially the United States. The focus of government officials on expanding and resuming relations with Western countries failed to do the expectations of the Iranian people. The dominance of the Western approach on the Eastern economics of Iran's foreign policy has a variety of reasons, including the weight of Western countries. This is important because, in some respects, the economic and political relations of the Eastern countries, including Afghanistan (at the present time) with Iran, are somehow influenced by the anti-Iranian American discourse.

 According to the findings of this study, the Eastern Territory (Afghanistan and South Khorasan) can be useful in facilitating and deepening the country's regional interactions. The territory of the East (Afghanistan and South Khorasan) can be fruitful in facilitating and deepening the regional interactions of the country. Although Kabul-Tehran's economic relations are heavily influenced by the US-sponsored and US-backed discourse against Iran, inevitably Import of goods from Iran is particularly fueled for the country (Afghanistan), due to lack of proper manufacturing infrastructure, as well as increased demand for its consumer market and the existence of geographic, cultural, and convergent factors. What can make this link more robust is the role of eastern provinces, such as South Khorasan.

The political, cultural, security and geographic location of the South Khorasan is a good basis for attracting more investment from foreign countries, especially Afghanistan. The expansion of Afghan investment of 2013 So far is promising the brilliant future of this province in the economic interactions of the two countries. This is important in relation to the role of the other eastern provinces, Khorasan Razavi and Sistan and Baluchistan, in increasing the export of Iranian goods to Afghanistan.

To the same extent as the South Khorasan plays an important role in the relations between Iran and Afghanistan, it equally affects the process. The boost in exports to Afghanistan, in particular, the country's first target market for goods in South Khorasan, has resulted in increased revenues from the province, including taxes and customs duties. Therefore, the increase in trade between the two countries will mean the growth of southern Khorasan in the long run. On the other hand, the impact of the economic development of this province on improving the economic interactions between Iran and Afghanistan is undeniable. To achieve these goals, it is proposed that special attention be paid to eastern provinces such as South Khorasan, Sistan and Baluchistan in domestic and foreign policy making of Iran. The Iranian government should strive to expand the exchanges and rail lines of the eastern provinces with the western provinces of Afghanistan. The view of securitization to these provinces must be reduced and the economic view replaced. With economic investment in the eastern provinces, dependence of neighboring countries in the east of Iran will increase.