Business news

MINSK, 11 May (BelTA) – Belarus and Romania hope to intensify trade and economic cooperation, Deputy Chairman of the Belarusian Chamber of Commerce and Industry Vladimir Ulakhovich told media ahead of the Belarusian-Romanian Business Forum on 11 May, BelTA has learned.

“I hope that the event will result in agreements that will lead to contracts. Some of Belarusian companies have already had preliminary agreements. Our products are supplied to Romania. We are confident that great headway will be made and the Belarusian products will be widely present on the Romanian market. These are the reasons we are holding the business forum today,” Vladimir Ulakhovich noted.

He noted that there is a certain assortment of goods Belarus supplies to Romania. “If we take a look at the results of our trade last year, we will see there is mechanical engineering, metallurgy, petrochemistry, cosmetics there,” Vladimir Ulakhovich said.

Last year $11.5 million worth of Belarusian tractors were sold to Romania. “We hope that this machinery will be needed even more taking into account that today’s agriculture in Romania is farms and sole proprietors,” said the Deputy Chairman of the Belarusian Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

According to Vladimir Ulakhovich, metallurgy, woodworking and IT technologies are promising areas for cooperation. He stressed that it is necessary to shift away from simple trade in goods and services. “Belarus and Romania are comparable in per capita GDP. The future is in joint production and joint advancement of products to third markets. However, in order to more forward, we need to meet, hold business forums. It is very important that today we will have a meeting of the intergovernmental Belarusian-Romanian commission on economic cooperation, which is to open new themes in the political dialogue and provide official support to business,” he said.

In turn, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Romania to Belarus Viorel Mosanu said that diplomats of the two countries are optimistic about the development of the Belarusian-Romanian relations. “Political dialogue between the two countries has been developing dynamically. Last year we held many bilateral meetings. We have also been successfully developing cultural relations. Several events were arranged in Minsk and Grodno. The Embassy will be working to develop relations between local communities and regions of Belarus and Romania,” he said.

Ambassador Viorel Mosanu called the meeting of the commission and business forum as an important step towards the development of economic relations between the two countries. “We hope that the contacts will give a new impetus to trade and economic cooperation,” he noted.