Business news

MINSK, 12 July (BelTA) – It is necessary to raise Belarus-Georgia trade turnover to $200 million while in 2015 the figure stood at $45 million. Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko gave the relevant instructions on 12 July, BelTA learned from Mikhail Myatlikov, who had been appointed Ambassador of Belarus to Georgia.

“The President gave instructions to raise the trade turnover to $200 million. We are already making plans to arrange a full-scale national expo of Belarus as part of Expo Georgia in Tbilisi in early September. The Georgian private sector demonstrates a strong interest,” said Mikhail Myatlikov. Belarus’ capabilities in the area of information technologies will be presented during the forthcoming forum among other things.

Speaking about trade turnover at present, Mikhail Myatlikov noted it is balanced. In January-April 2016 Belarus’ export growth rate totaled 126%.

Belarusian-Georgian economic relations rely on many commodities. Belarus exports mechanical engineering and petrochemical industry products. “In the future we may open enterprises to assemble products of Minsk Tractor Works, Mogilevliftmash. I think joint ventures will be set up in Belarus, too. Georgia sells a lot of fruits and vegetables to us. Those are critical imports we don’t have. Deep processing inside Belarus taking into account the available space will allow us to reach other markets of the Eurasian Economic Union, too,” noted the Ambassador.

Pharmaceutics is another promising industry for cooperation. Mikhail Myatlikov mentioned that 200 Belarusian pharmaceutical substances are already registered and are being exported to Georgia.

Apart from that, Belarus works hard to export transport services to Georgia, with the figure already at $14 million.

Mikhail Myatlikov also said that initially they will have to find premises for the embassy since the Belarusian diplomatic mission in Georgia is only opening now.