The Belarusian-Russian intergovernmental agreement on a unified industrial policy is a strategic document.

This was stated by the Deputy Prime Minister of Belarus

after the signing ceremony, which took place on February 15 in Moscow, informs BelTA.

"A unified space is being created where common rules and laws will be used in the area of ​​industrial policy," Parkhomczyk said.

According to him, the agreement completes the work carried out by the governments of Belarus and Russia in the industrial sphere within the framework of 28 integration programs signed in November 2021.

"Last year, agreements were signed in the field of microelectronics, on mutual recognition of technological operations," said the vice-prime minister.

— And this document seems to complete the set of issues that determine the development of industry in Belarus and Russia.

This means making joint decisions, creating joint competencies, and in different directions."

Pyotr Parkhomczyk said that the Belarusian and Russian sides had already done some work within the framework of the agreement on the unified industrial policy even before it was signed.

As an example, he gave a joint solution to the issue of replacing engines in the production of 220-ton BelAZ trucks from American to Russian ones.

As another example, he cited the agreements on the production of unified units and auto components for MAZ and KAMAZ cars in Belarus and Russia, which will make it possible to reduce the cost of final products and make them more affordable.

Parkhomczyk believes that the agreement will allow "achieving technological sovereignty within the framework of the Union State."

He also clarified that the agreement came into force from the moment of its signing.

Now the parties will develop a detailed "road map" for the implementation of the document.

What else

was

united

In December 2020, Minsk and Moscow ratified the treaty "On General Principles of Indirect Taxation" almost simultaneously (December 20 in Belarus, December 21 in Russia).

According to the document, every year the parties "bring their tax legislation into compliance with the provisions of the agreement."

The next step is the establishment of a joint supranational tax committee of Belarus and Russia, whose decisions will be binding for the parties.

On September 9, 2022, the Ministry of Transport of Russia signed an intergovernmental agreement on the transit of Belarusian goods through the territory of the Russian Federation.

The document provides for the creation of alternative routes for the delivery of export products.

Cargo transportation to third countries will be carried out both through sea ports and through land transport infrastructure.

"A step towards absorbing the economic institutions of Belarus"

A number of independent experts considered the latest agreements, including in the tax sphere, as a partial loss of the financial and economic sovereignty of Belarus.

Economist

previously expressed the opinion that the creation of so-called supranational bodies is a step towards absorbing the economic institutions of Belarus.

"After all, if some kind of monetary correlation is made, if the share of Russian rubles in the gold and foreign exchange reserves increases, all this brings closer to the fact that the economic institutions of Belarus will be absorbed by Russia.

If such a supranational body with unknown powers is created at a time when there is a formal link to a specific transition to the Russian monetary system, this is one step towards the loss of sovereignty.

"Belarus has never been so close to losing its economic sovereignty as today," economist Yaroslav Ramanchuk told Svaboda in December 2022.