OREANDA-NEWS. September 26, 2011. Moldovan and Austrian business people met in Chisinau, within the framework of a business forum, organized by the Moldovan Economics Ministry, the Investment and Export Promotion Organization (MIEPO), the Austrian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Bucharest-based Austrian embassy.

At the beginning of the event, Deputy Prime Minister, Economics Minister Valeriu Lazar, said that the main objective of the forum is to step up economic relations between Moldova and Austria. This forum is a good opportunity to identify new and attractive cooperation fields, which will foster the bilateral trade. "Thus, the good political ties between our countries will lead to a closer Moldovan-Austrian cooperation," Lazar stressed.

The deputy prime minister praised the increased interest of the Austrian side in Moldova, in terms of foreign trade and investments. Lazar said that presently there are about 90 companies with Austrian capital recorded in Moldova. The share of Austrian investments accounts for 1.4 per cent of the overall investments in Moldova.

For his part, Commercial Counsellor of the Bucharest-based Austrian embassy Rudolf Lukavsky, stressed that the today's event serves as "an eloquent proof of the Austrian business people's willingness to establish cooperation ties with their Moldovan partners, as well as a good pre-requisite for the consolidation of economic relations between the two countries".

The economic crisis has hit all the countries, including Moldova. Yet, the statistics for 2010 show that Moldova is on the right development path, the Austrian official said. In the context, Rudolf Lukavsky pointed out the interest of Austrian entrepreneurs to invest in Moldova, in several economic fields: the textile industry, processing of agricultural goods, infrastructure, constructions, services, information technologies, as well as other sectors in which the Austrian investors had already got involved. Lukavsky said that in the nearest future, a string of projects aimed at restoring and upgrading hospitals might be carried out in Moldova, with the support of Austrian investors.

According to data put out by the Economics Ministry, in the first quarter of 2011 the turnover of Moldovan goods exported to Austria stood at 5.6 million dollars, by 65.6 per cent more than in the same period of 2010. At the same time, the import of Austrian goods to Moldova was estimated at 43.4 million dollars, by 59.2 per cent more compared to the first quarter of 2010.