New BELAZ CEO on Western sanctions, holding’s plans and new promising technique

Despite sanctions, BELAZ continues to operate successfully, implementing investment projects and offering new models of equipment – unrivalled on the Belarusian and Russian markets – as noted by Sergei Lesin, who has been appointed today by President Aleksandr Lukashenko as Director General of BELAZ JSC – Management Company of BELAZ-HOLDING

photo: www.belta.by

The new manager recalled that BELAZ has been under sanctions since June 2021, and this definitely creates additional difficulties. However, the past period has confirmed that this is ‘high praise from Western competitors’, and all the artificially created problems have been overcome with our heads held high.

Sergei Lesin stressed, “There is no doubt that we succeeded in terms of working under restrictions. We are working; moreover, we are actively modernising the main site in Zhodino, implementing large investment projects in the Vitebsk, Brest, Mogilev regions and in the subsidiaries in the Minsk District. We received very good results for 2023.”

Based on the results of 2021-2023, production increased by 200 percent, and therefore the bar for this year is also quite high. The holding’s management aims to maintain the achieved rate of production volumes and plans to increase its presence in the mining equipment niche.

Sergei Lesin stated that due to sanctions restrictions, the Russian market in this segment has become vacant, “We have opportunities used by us since last year, carting out trial operation of samples. We are already at the stage of signing serious contracts for 2024-2025.”

He refers to heavy-duty mine dump trucks with a lifting capacity of 30-50 tonnes and load haul dumpers with a lifting capacity of 16-17 tonnes. In this class, only Western equipment or Belarusian BELAZ will be presented.

The company also plans to develop the production of railway cars, with its branch in Mogilev operating successfully, actively exporting its goods and modernising the site itself.

“By improving the quality and reliability of equipment, by developing new niches, our mining equipment in the short term, as well as hydraulic excavators (which no one produced in the post-Soviet space) and heavy graders in the medium term will gain a strong foothold in future. We won’t focus merely on mining dump trucks,” underlined the new CEO of BELAZ.

Answering the question about how the issue of imported components for equipment is being settled under the conditions of sanctions pressure, Sergei Lesin said that today about 70 percent of spare parts and materials are manufactured in Belarus and Russia, “We buy about 30 percent of components from friendly countries. Nevertheless, we are working to have equipment whose Belarus-Russia localisation is close to 97-99 percent. There are such examples. This work is currently underway.”