From Qajar to Today
Seven years after the death of Karim Khan Zand and after the turbulence of claimants to the throne and the period of instability that had begun in the early Qajar era. The Persian Gulf was in its worst political, security, social and economic condition and its islands, including Kish Island, suffered severe damage from this instability. The English, who themselves had caused part of this unrest, first occupied Qeshm Island and, by turning it into a naval base, moved to seize other islands. The incursions of the Portuguese, the English, pirates and the sheikhdoms and the Sultan of Muscat — most of which were instigated by the English — made the maritime region of the Persian Gulf completely unsafe, and this was precisely what the English wanted so that, with this pretext, they could force the Sheikh of Bahrain, who was under Iranian protection, to accept their protectorate and remove that island from Iran's control. In these sharp declines in the social and political situation of the Persian Gulf region, the economic and social condition of Kish Island reached such a point that this bride of the Persian Gulf islands, with all its legendary fame and past commercial wealth and position, was sold in the early Constitutional Revolution for only 25,000 tomans by Mirza Ebrahim Khan Ghavam al-Dawla to Mohammadreza Khan Bastaki.
Kish during the former regime (Pahlavi monarchy)
The deplorable condition of Kish during the reign of Reza Shah was more or less almost the same as in the Qajar period. For a long time the English exercised authority over the waters of the Persian Gulf and its millennia-old Iranian islands under the pretext of maintaining security and according to old imposed contracts, especially to protect Iran's oil-bearing lands. The presence of foreigners and the hardships they imposed caused the Iranian islands of the Persian Gulf gradually to be emptied of inhabitants and to become semi-ruined and abandoned. Trade and commerce in them were practically suspended. These conditions caused everyone to migrate, and the miserable visage of poverty and ruin of this island, which was the bride of the Persian Gulf, turned into a place of mourning with a few ancient trees and a few hectares of helpless cultivated land and a small number of inhabitants — women and children, helpless old men and women who could not migrate. This regrettable situation, with more or less minor changes, continued on the island from 1941 to 1968.
Beginning of transformations
The year 1968 marked the start of administrative changes and some executive moves on Kish Island with proposals from American experts to designate it as a free tourist port. In 1970 the exploitation of the island's geographical and natural conditions attracted attention, and Kish was chosen as an international tourism and commercial center. In 1972 the island took the name Kish Development Organization and was registered with one billion in capital. In 1973 the construction operations and building activities of the Kish Development Organization began from Masheh village in the northeast of the island; simultaneously construction of a equipped international airport for the landing of the world's largest aircraft, Concorde, began in the central-eastern part. In 1977 the Kish International Tourism and Commercial Center was inaugurated and the construction of almost all of the main service structures, which were relatively extensive, was completed.
In 1979, one year after the Revolution and the removal of the previous regime, the Kish Development Organization was handed over to the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance as the organization of Iran Touring and Tourism Centers, but five months later the Revolutionary Council declared it the first free trade zone of the Islamic Republic. In 1982, by a government decree, the Kish Development Organization became a "subsidiary of" the Minister Adviser for Executive Affairs. In 1986 the Revolutionary Council reopened Kish for travel and shopping from its markets. That year was effectively the year of Kish's revival as a free zone. From that time, with the flood of tourists, the incessant expansion of Kish began with various commercial constructions, markets, expansion of ports, airport development, construction of new hotels, industrial and commercial activities for export and import, new recreational spaces, squares, roads, and green spaces suited to the needs of the growing resident and tourist population; and these activities increased in scale each day, and Kish gained its prominent position among other free zones that were formed afterward through calculated planning.