Page 20 - BELRptFeb19

Belarusian Ambassador to Russia Vladimir Semashko has said he sees the priority of his mission in Moscow in removing deficit in trade with Russia .
"As a matter of fact, the Belarusian president has set a key task to spare no effort to remove serious trade deficit. Our external debt amounts to 40% of the GDP. It is not a dangerous level yet but is nearing it, mostly because we have negative balance of trade with Russia," he said in an interview with TASS.
"In the first ten months of 2018, trade deficit increased by $3.5bn on the same period in 2017 due to hiking prices on oil and oil products. If the tax manoeuvre is fully implemented, we will have to overpay an extra of $3Bbn a year," he said.
"As for the gas prices, we want them in the long run to approach Russia’s domestic prices by the moment of establishing a common energy market in 2025."
On the other hands, in his words, the two countries should find a solution to the problem of non-discrimination of Belarusian products on the Russian market. "It is not right when Russia’s agricultural watchdog imposes sanctions bringing down our exports of meat and dairy products by $650mn. There are questions about supplies of machinery," Semashko noted.
He said that in an effort to resolve these problems, Belarus and Russia may initiate various joint projects. Thus, in his words, seven core enterprises have been chosen for these purposes. They are Russia’s Rostselmash, Kamaz, GAZ and the Kirov Tractor Works and Belarus’ MTZ, MAZ and Gomselmash.
5.2.1 Import/export dynamics
Belarus-Germany trade turnover is supposed to reach $3bn in 2018.
Belarusian Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Evgeny Shestakov made the statement during the session of the Belarusian-German working group on trade and investments in the China-Belarus industrial park Great Stone on 19 December, BelTA has learned. Positive dynamics in Belarus-Germany trade has continued this year. In January-October 2018 trade turnover rose by nearly 18% in comparison with the same period of last year to $2.7bn. Belarus' export went up by 35.8% to $1.2bn. “I believe we can reach $3bn trade turnover as a result of this year,” said the official. In his words, Belarus-Germany trade is getting more balanced. It is also important that the structure of Belarus' export to Germany is sufficiently diversified: over 400 commodity items were exported in 2017-2018.
Belarus-Azerbaijan trade totalled $400mn in January-October 2018 and is projected to increase to $450-500mn by the end of the year, Belarus Ambassador to Azerbaijan Gennady Akhramovich told a press conference to sum up the results of Belarus-Azerbaijan cooperation in 2018.
20 BELARUS Country Report February 2019 www.intellinews.com