In the near future, escalation of the two-way trade and volume of mutual investments with Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan will become an easier task due to Program of Ukraine’s Cooperation with Customs Union Countries approved by the Ukrainian government. Industrial cooperation in various sectors industry, machine building, aviation and shipbuilding, space industry, fuel and energy complex, transport, agriculture, and tourism with Russia alone can bring over 50 billion USD, the Information-Analytical Bulletin of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine reports.
The main priority of the program is to increase mutual trade turnover by 10-15%, to establish of joint ventures, and increase investments from the Customs Union (CU) countries in the local economy to increase production of non-commodity goods for joint sale. According to experts, efficiency of cooperation will be growing in stages; thus, at present there is no need to forecast an immediate reduction of economic risks, as the international economy will accelerate its growth in the second half of the year.
The program and agreements reached on its basis will support the businesses that became hostages of unfavorable terms for their development in the middle of the last year. Back then, according to some estimates, drop of trade turnover between Russian and Ukrainian business reached 23-25%.
The program is also a part of the plan on deeper integration of Ukraine into economic consolidation between the CU and Eurasian Economic Community. As is known, the cooperation between the parties has objectively intensified since Ukraine obtained the observer status in the Eurasian Economic Commission.
