OREANDA-NEWS. On April 06, 2009 President Alexander Lukashenko has met with Premier Sergei Sidorsky to receive his report, reported the Official website president.gov.by.

The Prime Minister informed the Head of State on the fulfilment of the resolutions taken by the Supreme State Council of the Belarus-Russia Union State in accordance with the Joint Anti-Crisis Action Plan of the Governments of the Russian Federation and the Republic of Belarus.

This document sets forth the timeframe for taking specific decisions on mutual state support for companies operating in the real production sector of the Belarusian and Russian economies, decisions related to state procurements, allowing Belarusian producers to partake in Russian state procurement programmes, and decisions regarding resumption of supplies of products by using leasing schemes.

The Premier said that all the necessary decisions were taken in Belarus in Q1. However, the Russian side has not yet taken decisions that would ensure equal access to state support. Specifically, no changes have been made so far to the document that had introduced preferential amendments for goods originating in Russia.

The President of Belarus emphasized once again that economic entities of the two countries should enjoy equal rights as to the access to the home markets of Belarus and Russia. In this regard, the Belarusian Government was tasked to intensify interaction with the Government of the Russian Federation to reach mutually acceptable solutions on the agreements negotiated at the February meeting of the Supreme State Council.

The two also discussed ways to support the Belarusian industrial sector. The Government submitted a proposal to the President to provide support to large auto-makers, producers of industrial equipment and companies operating in other economy sectors. The results of Q1 revealed difficulties with selling Belarusian products in Belarus’ traditional sales markets. In this respect, the Belarusian Government proposes to support the domestic industrial sector. A number of proposals were submitted to purchase equipment in the domestic market, first of all by tapping into innovation funds of ministries and oblast executive committees, and supply equipment and vehicles to agricultural companies for gathering harvest.

The meeting also touched upon a number of issues related to liberalization of the economy. In particular, the two discussed taxation of revenues of joint-stock companies.