BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

26/11/2008

Belarus, Germany to discuss trade and investment cooperation

Belarus and Germany plan to discuss the most important joint strategic economic projects, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Belarus to Germany Vladimir Skvortsov told BelTA.

The tenth session of the Belarusian-German working group for trade and investments will take place in Berlin on November 26. The Belarusian delegation will be led by Deputy Foreign Minister Valery Voronetsky.

The session is supposed to talk over the state and prospects of the bilateral relations and the credit and investment cooperation between Belarus and Germany.

The sides are expected to discuss the possibility of signing an agreement on mutual recognition of testing protocols and compliance certificates for exported and imported products, an agreement on organisation of joint conformance evaluation, promotion of contacts with the German national consultative centre for the REACH regulation (Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemical substances).

Germany will be informed about the steps Belarus takes to improve the country's investment climate as well as the progress in implementing credit agreements, which were signed against guarantees of the Belarusian government. As lately some investment projects for modernising and rebuilding Belarusian companies require resources, which exceed the limit set by German agency for insuring export loans Euler Hermes, there are plans to discuss raising the limit and raising the country's limit by 50%. Simultaneously some matters regarding the prospects of raising Belarus' country credit risk rating in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) will be discussed.

According to the Ambassador, since its establishment the Belarusian-German working group for trade and investments has become an effective instrument of interagency cooperation in a wide range of issues regarding the bilateral trade and economic relations.

The Belarusian-German working group for trade and investments was established within the framework of the Belarusian-German council for economic cooperation. The working group operates in line with article 21 of the Belarusian-German agreement on the development of large-scale cooperation in economy, industry, science and technologies of April 2, 1993.

In Germany Valery Voronetsky is expected to meet with the leadership of the German federal bodies of the state administration. The Belarusian official also will take part in the opening of the Office of Belarus' Honorary Consul in Kottbus.

According to the Belarus Foreign Ministry, in January-September 2008, the trade between Belarus and Germany made up $2.657 billion or 30.1% up over the same period 2007. The export reached $636.5 million (35% up), the import reached $2.021 billion (28.7% up).

All in all, within the framework of the German credit lines (against the guarantees of the Belarusian Government), since 1992 Belarusian companies have attracted loans at the amount of more than ?550 million.

In January-September 2008, the total German investments in the Belarusian economy made up $73.3 million including $58.3 million of direct investments.

There are 338 companies with the participation of German capital and 76 representation offices of German companies in Belarus. There are 6 representations of Belarusian companies in Germany.

Source:

http://capital.trendaz.com/index.shtml?show=news&newsid=1355505&lang=EN

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