Moldovan-Russian business forum held in Chisinau

Chisinau, 7 November /MOLDPRES/ - A Moldovan-Russian business forum, organized by the Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCI), is held in Chisinau today.  

„In the last ten years, we have organized more meetings with the participation of business people from both countries. CCI has signed 25 agreements on cooperation with chambers of commerce and industry from Russia, nationally and regionally,” CCI deputy president Mihai Balba said.

One of the biggest business meetings was organized in 2017, with the participation of representatives of about 300 companies, of which 60 from Russia, Mihai Balba noted. He underlined that Russia was one of the “principal partners of Moldova.”  

The CCI deputy president also said that, during the forum, due to last two days, on 7-8 November, bilateral meetings would be held, within which entrepreneurs will have possibility to establish business and partnership relations with economic agents from the Sverdlovsk region of Russia. “I hope that, during meetings, business people from Moldova and Russia will make new ties and the volume of trade exchanges between both countries will increase,” Balba stressed.  

The president of the Ural Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Aleksey Salov, presented the Russian companies which participate in the Forum. Among them, there are the Design Institute from Sverdlovsk, the industrial group from the electronic sector, the Ecoupack company, specialized in producing packaging and a company for producing bearings.      

„All our companies are interested in cooperating with Moldovan enterprises,” Aleksey Salov stressed.     

Data by the National Statistics Bureau shows that the exports of Moldovan goods to the Russian market decreased significantly after the Moldovan parliament had ratified the Association Agreement with EU, in July 2014, when Russia imposed customs duties on the import of 19 categories of goods from Moldova. The exports diminished from 423 million dollars in 2014 to 254 million dollars in 2017. Official statistics for the first eight months of 2018 shows that the Moldovan exports to the Russian market dropped by 11 per cent against the same period of the year before, to 144 million dollars, while the imports from Russia increased by 26.38 per cent up to 433 million dollars.   

As many as 995 enterprises with Russian or mixed capital, with investments worth one billion 105 million lei, are recorded in Moldova.

(Reporter V. Bercu, editor A. Raileanu)