Business news

MINSK, 22 June (BelTA) – It is necessary to set up a cluster of energy-intensive enterprises around the Belarusian nuclear power plant. Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko made the statement during the fifth Belarusian People’s Congress on 22 June, BelTA has learned.

The country’s energy industry will develop rapidly in the current five-year term. Both reactors of the Belarusian nuclear power plant will go online in 2018-2020. About 2,000 jobs will be created.

“It will be a step towards cheaper energy resources. Hence it will contribute to bolstering the competitive ability of all the branches of the national economy: the production sector, transport, services sphere. Belarus should utilize advantages of nuclear energy to set up a cluster of energy-intensive enterprises around the nuclear power plant. It is necessary to enable conditions to encourage corporations and individuals to switch from natural resources, for instance, oil and natural gas, to comparatively inexpensive electricity,” noted Alexander Lukashenko.

The President pointed out that once the nuclear power plant goes online, more electricity will be generated in the country. This is why it is necessary to take measures now to substitute natural gas with electricity. Speaking about import, Alexander Lukashenko noted that there will be customers, provided a quality product is available at a good price.

“It is necessary to substitute what we have in short supply — natural gas, oil, and so on — with electricity,” the President said. “It is necessary to prepare our economy and people for the fact that we will have an abundance of electricity. We need electric stoves in Belarusian households instead of gas ones. It is necessary to make them effective just like the rest of the world has already learned to make them.”

Alexander Lukashenko drew attention to the fact that Belarus will not have any electricity to waste. “We will handle everything wisely,” stressed the President.