OREANDA-NEWS. January 11, 2012. A meeting of the Russian-Turkish and Turkish-Russian Business Councils and a Russian-Turkish business forum have taken place at the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Russia.

CCI of Russia Vice-President Georgy Petrov, Turkish Charge d’Affaires in Russia Ceren Yazgan, Russian-Turkish Business Council Chairman Akhmet Palankoyev, Turkish-Russian Business Council Chairman Erman Ilicak, Mining Academy President Yuri Malyshev, Chairman of the CCI of Russia Committee for Tourism, Recreation and Hospitality Industry, Vice-President of the Russian Union of Travel Industry Yury Barzykin, Trade Representative of the Turkish embassy in Russia Attila Kizilarslan and representatives of the Turkish embassy in Russia, Russian and Turkish business communities attended the meeting.

Georgy Petrov opened and chaired the event. He briefly summed up results of the national economic development in 2011 and said that Russia had basically recovered from the crisis – the GDP growth will top 4% this year, and inflation will be within 7%. Cooperation with foreign states develops successfully.

In the opinion of Georgy Petrov, the Russian entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO) was a landmark event in the foreign economic history of modern Russia. There is a significant growth of direct foreign investments in the real economic sector, which lays down a good foundation for Russian relations with Turkey, Georgy Petrov said.

That naturally had an effect on foreign trade, which regained the pre-crisis level. In order to achieve greater stability, it is necessary to broaden industrial relations and investment cooperation, the Vice-President of the CCI of Russia presumed. Georgy Petrov singled out construction, agriculture and tourism as leading areas of bilateral cooperation. The number of Russians who visited Turkey in 2011 significantly exceeded 3 million. It is necessary to give more attention to cooperation in innovations and high-tech industries in the future, Georgy Petrov recommended the meeting participants. He said in conclusion that the meeting would support the existent relations and promote new contracts and mutually advantageous deals.

Turkish Charge D’Affaires in Russia Ceren Yazgan thanked the Russian Chamber for the warm welcome and declared a significant growth of bilateral trade in 2011. She also affirmed intensified political and economic relations. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan visited Russia in 2011 and took part in meetings on various levels.

The visa-free travel for Russian citizens was an important event, which enlarged tourism. In the words of Ceren Yazgan, Turkish investments in the real sector of the Russian economy are steadily growing and mutually advantageous cooperation is developing successfully. The Turkish-Russian Business Council is a platform for developing new joint projects and a new vision of further mutually beneficial cooperation in the real economic sector, Turkish Charge d’Affaires in Russia Ceren Yazgan said.

Russian-Turkish Business Council Chairman Akhmet Palankoyev continued the subject of mutually beneficial cooperation between business communities of the two countries. He said that Russian-Turkish trade and economic cooperation were dynamic in general. According to the Russian Federal Customs Service, trade with Turkey stood at USD 25.3 billion in 2010, which was 29% more than in 2009. Russia ranks second amongst foreign trade partners of Turkey, and its share in the Turkish foreign trade is 9.3%. The sides are interacting in construction, agriculture, food industry, transportation, logistics and tourism.

Trade and economic cooperation between Russia and Turkey develop within a broad legal framework, which includes the intergovernmental agreement on the promotion and mutual protection of investments, the agreement on the prevention of dual taxation and the agreement on gas and energy cooperation, Akhmet Palankoyev said. The main goal of both business councils is the active encouragement of mutually beneficial trade and economic relations between Russia and Turkey, the growth of trade and investments, and the creation of favorable conditions for Russian and Turkish companies.

Turkish-Russian Business Council Chairman Erman Ilicak said that the current phase of Russian-Turkish relations was probably the best in the 500-year-long modern history of both states. Turkey-Russia trade reached USD 30 billion in 2011 (as compared with USD 11 billion of Turkey-U.S. trade and USD 2.5 billion of Turkey-Spain trade in 2011), three million Russian tourists visited Turkey, and Russian investments in the Turkish economy grew. Turkish companies operating in various branches of the Russian economy enjoy constant support of the Council, Erman Ilicak said. Twenty percent of the total oil and gas imports of Turkey come from Russia, he said. Russia has launched the project of a nuclear power plant with the value of USD 20 billion. The power plant may meet 10% of the national demand for electric power.

Mining Academy President Yury Malyshev urged Turkish companies to become pioneers in the development of Russian man-made deposits. He said the slag deposits started forming in Russia actively in the 1940s-1950s and currently amount to 40-50 billion tons. The metal content in the slag is sometimes much higher than in ore mined at the increasingly big depths, which results in the constant growth of mining expenditures. The Mining Academy is ready to help any Turkish companies, which wish to develop Russian man-made deposits, Yury Malyshev said. He said the niche was practically unoccupied by foreign or Russian companies.

Trade Representative of the Turkish Embassy in Russia Attila Kizilarslan called attention to the prospects of construction cooperation and the need to remove administrative impediments. He said that Turkish companies wished to invest in Russia and Russian investments in the Turkish economy would be welcome. The Turkish embassy in Russia is ready to promote contacts of the sort.

Chairman of the CCI of Russia Committee for Tourism, Recreation and Hospitality Industry, Vice-President of the Russian Union of Travel Industry Yury Barzykin dwelt on tourism prospects. He said that over 12 million Russian tourists went abroad each year, and a fourth of them visited Turkey.

In turn, the number of Turkish tourists in Russia is growing tangibly. With the goal of further enlargement of Russian tourism in Turkey, the size of insurance policy of Russian tourists and the amount of medical services offered to them in Turkey will be drastically reviewed next year. The very essence of the tourist product will change, and a special emphasis will be put on rehabilitation, sea cruises, historical and cultural trips and pilgrimage to Christian holy places in Turkey.

Yury Barzykin welcomed the visa-free travel between Russia and Turkey. He also said that preferential air fares offered by Turkish airlines also had big prospects.

Culture and Tourism Counselor of the Turkish Embassy in Russia Celal Kilic stressed that tourism gave a boost to related areas, such as construction, healthcare and security, which meant that tourism promoted the general economic growth.

Advisor to the Federal Center for Grain and Grain Product Quality and Safety Evaluation Director Vladimir Popovich said that Russian gas supplies to Turkey grew to 1.5 million tons in 2010. Amid the favorable backdrop, Russia has certain concerns about phytosanitary safety of imported Turkish foods in the light of new rules of the Customs Union, which shifted control to the external boundaries.

Polluted products are not the fault of controlling bodies of the Turkish Republic; it is a fault of producers and exporters, Vladimir Popovich said, noting that scrupulous producers were vitally interested in the delivery of high quality foods that complied with the regulations of the European Union and Russia. Thanks to the agreements of Russia and Turkey, the amount of potentially unsafe foods was cut thrice in the recent past.

After the plenary meeting, the Russian-Turkish economic forum continued to work in sections, which focused on construction, tourism and agriculture.