Kazakhstan and Ukraine increase trade turnover
By Aynur Jafarova
The trade turnover between Kazakhstan and Ukraine increased by 24 percent last year, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev said at the meeting with his Ukrainian counterpart Victor Yanukovych, who visited Astana to attend the session of the Eurasian Economic Community on May 29.
Kazakhstan hosted the session of the Eurasian Economic Community, which was attended by the president of Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Belarus, Russia and Kyrgyzstan.
Speaking at the session, Nazarbayev said that the integration should be beneficial for all its participants.
He said the establishment of the Customs Union of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia, Single Economic Space and the Eurasian Economic Union is complex. However, the political will of the heads of the countries is very important in this issue.
The integration process is beneficial for all participants not only for the increase of the trade turnover but also for gaining appropriate place in the developing world and the modern economic situation, he said.
Nazarbayev went on to say that Kyrgyzstan has already requested to join the Customs Union. A working group was created which is developing an appropriate "roadmap." Ukraine also expressed its intention to participate in future at the work of the Customs Union, Single Economic Space and the Eurasian Economic Union with the observer status. Due to this, Kyrgyzstan and Ukraine were invited to this session and participated at the discussions, the president said.
The parties have confirmed their intention to launch the work on the Eurasian Economic Union by January 1, 2015, he added.
According to Nazarbayev, the increase of the trade turnover between the countries leads to the creation of new working places and provides the preparation for competition in the global scale.
Later, the heads of states discussed a number of issues on the main directions of integration, in particular the activity of the Eurasian Economic Commission on the development of further interaction of the countries. A special attention was drawn to perspectives of the participation of Kyrgyzstan and Ukraine in the work of the Customs Union.
In conclusion of the session, the parties signed a number of documents, in particular on the implementation of main directions of the integration, creation of integrated information system of the foreign and domestic trade, expansion of interaction in the statistics field, coordinated agro-industrial policy of Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan.
The next sessions of the Eurasian Economic Community will be held in October in Minsk and in December in Moscow.