“It turns out that the circumvention of sanctions leads to increased competition in the Belarusian market” » News from Belarus – latest news for today

2023-06-17 10:56:58

The picture is illustrative

Our pennies are about the growth of exports and imports.

— According to the Belstat methodology, in January-April 2023 Belarus sold goods worth $12.8 billion abroad. This is immediately 14.3% more than in the same period last year.

It would seem that growth is not what you expect against the backdrop of sanctions. But the situation is more complicated than it looks at first glance.

First, the growth in exports is accompanied by an even stronger growth in imports. In January-April of this year, goods worth $13.8 billion were imported to Belarus from abroad (plus 18.2% compared to last year).

As a result of this, the balance of trade in goods was not in favor of Belarus (minus $1.0 billion). A year earlier, the negative balance was two times lower.

Secondly, the structure of growth in imports and exports of goods shows that the growth in sales of Belarusian goods is recorded in the CIS countries (+27.9%), while the growth in import deliveries falls on non-CIS countries (+61.5%).

As a result of attempts to be a hub to circumvent Western restrictions on trade with Russia, a lot of sanctioned goods pass through Belarus. It is likely that not all of them go to Russia, but, remaining in the country, they keep company with the locals.

It turns out that the circumvention of sanctions leads to increased competition in the Belarusian market. But are local producers ready for this?

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