EAEU countries can replace $70 bln in imports - Lukashenko

MINSK. May 25 (Interfax) - Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) countries can replace $70 billion worth of imported goods per year with products from domestic manufacturers, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said.

"More than a quarter of the manufactured goods imported into the union, about $70 billion worth per year, can be replaced with the products of national producers. A huge portion. The fourth industrial revolution provides a chance for effective implementation of import substitution initiatives in the real sector of the economy on the regional level," Lukashenko said at the second Eurasian Economic Forum in Moscow.

He said industrial cooperation will make it possible to create products under a Eurasian brand with a maximum degree of localization, as well as establish new import substitution projects.

"Regardless of the future dynamic of our relations with so-called western partners, technological sovereignty and replacement of critical imports will remain the foundation for the further development of our union," Lukashenko said.

Speaking about the prospects of and conditions for the development of the EAEU, he stressed the importance of nondiscriminatory access to energy resources for businesses.

"The development and deepening of integration cooperation in energy, the strengthening of the EAEU's position in the context of global security remains an important priority. I am convinced that the effective operation of our countries' economies is unthinkable without economic agents having equal access to energy resources and infrastructure for their transportation," Lukashenko said.

"No matter what we must ensure the realization of nondiscriminatory approaches in the area of pricing for the services of natural monopolies throughout the EAEU," he said.

Another priority in the development of the EAEU is to deepen integration on the food market, he said. It is "necessary to determine a list of critical imports for the food market of EAEU member countries [that can be replaced] with the capabilities of our own existing production facilities, their expansion and creation of new ones," Lukashenko said.

He also called for harmonizing measures of state support for agriculture and the legal grounds for providing it taking into account the national interests of member countries and accelerating digitization of production processes in crop and livestock farming.