Opinions & Interviews

MINSK, 28 March (BelTA) – The Minsk Days will take place in Russia’s St Petersburg in 2018, St Petersburg Governor Georgy Poltavchenko noted at the 10th session of the Belarus-St Petersburg Business Cooperation Council attended by Belarusian Prime Minister Andrei Kobyakov on 28 March, BelTA informs.

The governor pointed to the long-standing ties in trade, industry, culture, education, and youth policy between Belarus and St Petersburg.

In his words, Belarus-St Petersburg trade has always showed good dynamics. “Belarus is our major trading partner in the CIS. The country is also among out top 5 largest trading partners,” Georgy Poltavchenko stressed.

Belarus and St Petersburg have been successfully working on a number of projects under the Belarus-Russia Union State programs, primarily in instrumentation engineering and electronics, Georgy Poltavchenko added. “A concept of joint projects in medicine and pharmaceutics is yet to be agreed upon at the federal level,” he noted.

Belarus-St Petersburg trade reached $1.672 billion in 2017, up 19.7% from 2016. Exports stood at $967.4 million (up 18.6%), imports totaled $704.9% (up 21.2%). The trade balance of Minsk enjoyed a surplus of $262.5 million. The major export items were fresh and chilled beef, cheeses and quark, butter, poultry meat and by-products, milk, condensed cream, cream powder, trucks, and sugar. The major import items were cars, engines and electric generators, liquid pumps, pipe fittings, and construction materials from ferrous metals.

In January 2018, Belarus-St Petersburg trade totaled $125.9 million, up 24.7% from the same period a year prior. Exports amounted to $79.1 million (up 21.3%), imports made up $46.8 million (up 30.9%). The trade surplus was $32.3 million.