The Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) and Indonesia have agreed to hold the first round of negotiations on a free trade area (FTA) agreement in the first quarter of 2023. The respective document was signed by Minister of Trade of the Eurasian Economic Commission (EEC) Andrey Slepnev and Minister of Trade of the Republic of Indonesia Zulkifli Hasan. The EEC's trade bloc said in a statement.
"The Eurasian Economic Union attaches great importance to the development of mutually beneficial cooperation with Indonesia, which is one of our main trade partners in ASEAN and the Asia-Pacific region as a whole," commented Andrey Slepnev. - "We should use the remaining unexplored potential: the study showed that liberalization of trade conditions may allow to increase trade turnover by another $1.5 billion."
The minister says the EEC also sees trade prospects for agricultural goods and the industrial group. In addition, according to Andrey Slepnev, to effectively implement the future agreement it is also important to promote cooperation between business communities of the EEU and Indonesia. This will be facilitated by holding forums, trade and investment fairs, seminars, mutual assistance in finding partners.
"As one of the platforms where we could further discuss the prospects for deepening cooperation, we suggest organizing a bilateral business dialogue within the Eurasian Economic Forum in spring 2023," Slepnev said, thus expressing hope for Indonesian support of the event.
As it was reminded in the trading bloc of the EEC, following the results of January-September 2022 the trade turnover between the EAEC and Indonesia increased by 48.4% as compared with the same period of 2021, at that, export increased more than 2.5 times and import increased by about 16%.
GSV "Russia - Islamic World"
Photo: Ministry of Economic Development of the Russian Federation
Based on materials from TASS