Belarus, Venezuela to reset economic relations, covering joint production, petrochemicals, logistics
The major goal of Belarus and Venezuela is to restore the previous dynamics of trade-economic relations and eliminate all obstacles along this path, Venezuelan Vice President of Planning, Minister for Planning Ricardo Jose Menendez Prieto told reporters, commenting on the results of his meeting with the President of Belarus, Aleksandr Lukashenko
Ricardo Menendez indicated that there is extensive interaction between Belarus and Venezuela, which was launched during the time of Hugo Chavez and is now continued by the current leader Nicolas Maduro. Strong co-operative ties have been established between the two states, but at some point sanctions and pressure from Western countries disrupted the normal course of these relationships, “The major goal for today is to restore the dynamics and to overcome all the obstacles that exist along this path. We already boast certain achievements. At the moment, we’re talking about bringing our relations to a new level, strengthening ourselves in the fight against sanctions, moving forward together and planning a new stage of joint activities for the coming decade.”
According to the Vice President of Venezuela, the parties focused their attention on a range of mutually beneficial topics, “First of all, restarting of joint production facilities of tractors and vehicles was high on the agenda. There’s interest in joint petrochemical collaboration while the topic of logistics is also very important. We’re now working closely on all these issues.”
As far as the issue of Belarusian equipment supplies and subsequent assembly in Venezuela is concerned, which was discussed during Venezuelan FM Yvan Gil Pinto’s recent visit to Belarus, the guest stated, “There’re Belarusian-Venezuelan joint ventures on the territory of our country – the largest in the region. This refers to the joint production of tractors (production capacity of 10,000 units per year) and the joint assembly of MAZ vehicles (production capacity of 5,000 units per year). We’re talking not only about the production of this equipment, but also about its sale both in the domestic market and in the markets of neighbouring countries.”
Ricardo Menendez underlined that within the framework of the current visit and the joint commission meeting, a 2024 production plan is currently under discussion and development, enabling to place all the emphasis, identify the volumes and directions in which the parties will move both in terms of production and sales on the regional market.
