Opinions & Interviews

MINSK, 2 April (BelTA) – There are positive trends in the trade between Belarus and Russia, Belarus’ Ambassador to Russia Igor Petrishenko said in an interview to the Rossiyskaya Gazeta newspaper, BelTA has learned.

“There were crises in the 2000s. By the end of 2013, the mutual trade exceeded $40 billion. Then, there was a decline in 2014-2015. The trade turnover stabilized in 2016 and increased by 23.7% in 2017. There are positive trends: according to our statistics, the growth is 21.7% in January 2018, which gives us confidence that the measures we have taken are justifying themselves. All this time there has been intense work in all directions and on all levels in order to create a so-called barrier-free trading environment to develop even closer cooperation ties for functioning as a self-sufficient market within the Union State and the Eurasian Economic Union,” the diplomat said.

According to him, the most important thing is that the parties need to ensure coordinated export support of the joint product in deliveries to the markets of third countries. “We have signed a free trade agreement with Vietnam. This is a two-way road, which means that the Vietnamese market also opens up for the countries of the Eurasian Economic Union, primarily for the machine-building products of Russia and Belarus. These are Russian KamAZ vehicles, tractors, harvesters and our tractor machinery and MAZ products, aggregates, attachments for our tractor machinery, and harvesters. All this is important, including with respect to food products,” the ambassador said.

According to Igor Petrishenko, we are currently working on a free trade agreement with Iran, an agreement on the development of economic interaction with China. “There are a number of countries that would like to conclude an agreement with us. These are India, Israel and also from the Latin American continent. Our task is to create a barrier-free environment and act consistently on the markets of third countries to avoid unnecessary competition between our countries,” the diplomat said.

“We need clear rules of the game that we have signed in the framework of the Union State and the Eurasian Economic Union. Russia and Belarus have voluntarily delegated considerable powers in the field of trade and economic relations, technical regulation, phytosanitary and other measures to the Eurasian Economic Commission. It is necessary to implement the decisions taken by the bodies that we have vested with appropriate supranational powers. If something goes wrong, we need to adjust the work together. The whole structure should work effectively, moving the integration project forward. Then, there will be results,” the diplomat said.