The Belarusian leader is meeting with the governor of the Perm Territory on Thursday. During his visit to the republic, a delegation from this Russian region plans to visit a number of industrial enterprises.
Belarus is ready to share its own competencies in agriculture and build farms in the Perm Territory, Belarusian head of state Alexander Lukashenko said at a meeting with the governor of this Russian region Dmitry Makhonin on Thursday in Minsk, Sputnik correspondent reports.
The President stressed that Perm remains one of the most important economic partners of Belarus. This is confirmed by the figures: the trade turnover between the republic and the Russian region is kept at the level of about $0.5 billion. oil and gas condensate.
“In view of the decline in trade turnover, and it still fell a little, we need to take additional measures to restore this trade turnover. We must not only demonstrate that we can do without those who do not want to work with us, but we must demonstrate that we can still do a lot. We are at your service both in terms of supplies and cooperation,” Lukashenka noted.
God told us to cooperate
According to him, there are no regions in Russia that cannot be relied upon, and the Perm Territory is rich and promising.
“You say that your region is the backbone of Russia, I absolutely agree with that. And since you say that this is the backbone of Russia, then God ordered us to cooperate,” the Belarusian leader said.
He stressed that Belarus is primarily an agrarian country, the best competencies in this industry are preserved here, which the republic is ready to share with Perm partners.
“We saved our agriculture not because I worked in agriculture – I worked in a lot of places. This is not the question. The question is that after the collapse of the Soviet Union, you already remember this, people were starving, there was nothing to eat. If people not fed, there is nothing to talk about sovereignty, independence and existence in general,” the head of state said.
The President said that domestic specialists can implement projects for the construction of dairy complexes, poultry farms and other agricultural facilities in the Perm Territory, if there is a need for this.
“I always give an example: if at the request of Kozhemyako (Governor of the Primorsky Territory Oleg Kozhemyako – Sputnik) we did something in the Amur Region, then God ordered to work in the Perm Territory,” Alexander Lukashenko said.
Build “turnkey”
The head of state also noted that Belarusian builders are ready to build turnkey facilities in agriculture, the social sphere and industry.
“We are ready to get involved here. Moreover, after these sanctions we have imposed, we need to build on our own, engage in import substitution in all areas. Let’s overcome this together, supposedly some barriers. At least we have no disagreements with the President of Russia in this regard,” – he said.
Lukashenka recalled that the topic of import substitution is more relevant than ever in the current ones. According to him, Belarus has a successful experience on this topic with a number of Russian regions. Joint work on import substitution, namely the supply of building materials, has already been established by the ministries of construction of Belarus and the Perm Territory.
Similar economies
The governor of the Perm Territory, Dmitry Makhonin, in turn, said that the parties in the current economic conditions need to develop industrial cooperation, both in engineering and other industries. In addition, he noted that the region has a serious need to replace elevator equipment.
“We have a need to replace 1,700 elevators. We are increasing the pace of housing construction for the third year in a row and in the near future we will reach figures of about 1.5 million square meters – and this, in turn, will provide additional volumes for elevators,” the governor said.
According to the governor, during the visit to Belarus the delegation of the Perm Territory plans to visit a number of industrial enterprises – MAZ, MTZ, Gomselmash, Mogilevliftmash, Amkodor – and agree on cooperation.
Already after the meeting with the Belarusian leaders, Dmitry Makhonin told reporters that the economies of Belarus and the Perm Territory are very similar: 20% of the world’s potassium is produced in Belarus and the same in the Perm Territory. The same applies to the processing of petroleum raw materials.
“We have close cooperation in the military-industrial sector, between universities, in science and so on,” he concluded.
Oil and white chocolate
At the moment, the basis of Belarusian exports to the Perm Territory are trucks, antiknock agents, antioxidants, inhibitors, technical products, beef and other goods.
As for imports, oil (including gas condensate), oil products, resins, bread and flour confectionery, white chocolate, paper, cardboard, detergents and cleaning products are imported from the Kama region to Belarus.
