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Belarus to produce $29bn worth of import-substituting goods in 2023
GOMEL, 15 December (BelTA) – Belarusian Prime Minister Roman Golovchenko talked about the plans for the production of import-substituting goods during a working trip to Gomel, BelTA has learned
Roman Golovchenko stressed that import substitution is one of the main areas of focus, so it is difficult to single out a particular production project. "We expect that this year the output of import-substituting goods will amount to $29 billion. Two years ago it was about $26-27 billion. Next year we are set to exceed the $30 billion mark," he said.
The prime minister noted that import substitution projects are being implemented in different sectors. "For example, import substitution at Gomselmash was extremely challenging because the company used a lot of Western units. After the well-known events, great efforts were undertaken to redo all the documentation, negotiate with other suppliers, because there are no 100% analogues. This work has been done by engineers and designers at all our enterprises. For example the share of imported products at ZLiN is at 4% today. A very large cluster of Belarusian enterprises has been involved in the effort to replace imports for our large flagships," the prime minister explained.
Roman Golovchenko noted that enterprises of Gomel Oblast and the whole country are engaged in import-substituting programs. “This is what we always needed to do but lacked such an impetus [sanctions]. We had to deal with this due to the circumstances, and these efforts are yielding results. Such processes are underway in all sectors: from furniture to simplest products. Though they are simple only at first glance, because earlier we imported all of this. This had a negative impact on our balance of payments, and secondly, we actually gave money to other countries. Now these funds remain in the country, taxes on them are paid here too," he explained.
When asked about the prospects for new import-substituting manufactures, Roman Golovchenko stressed that it is difficult to single out some of them. "Because $29-30 billion is a fairly large share in the total volume of our industrial output," he concluded.
Prime Minister Roman Golovchenko paid a working visit to Gomel Oblast. He toured Alcopack, the Gomel branch of the Belarusian Prosthetic and Orthopedic Rehabilitation Center, and Gomel Casting and Normals Plant to examine the status of import-substituting programs.
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