EDB and the EAEU Business Council intend to fulfil projects in the Bank’s member states

Astana, 15 June 2017. Eurasian Development Bank (EDB) and the Eurasian Economic Union’s (EAEU) Business Council signed a memorandum of cooperation to develop partnership and long-term, efficient cooperation with a view to preparing and fulfilling projects in the Bank’s member states. The memorandum was signed by Dmitry Pankin, Chairman of the Management Board at EDB, and Viktor Khristenko, President of the EAEU Business Council, in the sidelines of the Astana Economic Forum on 15 June 2017.

The parties agreed to attract investment to prepare and fulfil projects with integration components in the EDB member states. They also intend to conduct joint expert, information and research activities and use them in practice to develop projects.

“In accordance with its strategy, the Bank focuses on projects with an integration effect. EDB and the EAEU Business Council will determine opportunities for cooperation between the countries in the context of integration and continue to participate in infrastructure projects in the region, thereby promoting sustainable economic growth in the Bank’s member states and the expansion of trade and economic ties between us through investment,” Dmitry Pankin commented.

“At the meeting of the Business Council’s Presidium that took place in April in Bishkek, we began to select projects promoting the development of transport and power infrastructure in the EAEU countries as well as Silk Road Economic Belt projects. This is the reason why we propose in this version of the agreement that the Committee for Trade and Economic Cooperation with China and other priority partners in trade negotiations be appointed as a coordinator. We need EDB’s expertise with respect to the initiatives that will combine interests of at least two or three parties out of the five countries. Each expert assessment provided by EDB, as an important development institution, will help us to devise a consistent approach to infrastructure regulation. In the future, after transport and the power sector, which are the priority sectors where we try to form harmonised approaches within the EAEU, we will understand how to co-finance, on the terms of public-private partnerships, projects in the area of financial technology as well as the digital reform of the economy as a whole,” Viktor Khristenko noted.

Timur Kulibayev, Chairman of the Presidium of the National Chamber of Entrepreneurs of Kazakhstan and the EAEU Business Council, added that, “Foreign experience suggests that cooperation and integration promote labour productivity, decrease transaction costs, and improve financial stability of businesses. All these factors help to advance industrial enterprises, improve employment, as well as to preserve, upgrade and renew infrastructure. The memorandum between the EAEU Business Council and EDB is a significant fostering Eurasian integration and economic growth in the EAEU.”

Additional Information:

Eurasian Development Bank (EDB) is an international financial institution founded by Russia and Kazakhstan in January 2006 with the mission to facilitate the development of market economies, sustainable economic growth, and the expansion of mutual trade and other economic ties in its member states. EDB’s charter capital totals US $7 billion. The member states of the Bank are the Republic of Armenia, the Republic of Belarus, the Republic of Kazakhstan, the Kyrgyz Republic, the Russian Federation, and the Republic of Tajikistan.

About the EAEU Business Council. After the Treaty on the Eurasian Economic Union took effect and the Republic of Armenia and the Kyrgyz Republic joined the EAEU on 2 January 2015, the Atameken National Chamber of Entrepreneurs of Kazakhstan proposed to set up the EAEU Business Council. The agreement establishing the Business Council was signed on 21 May 2015. Its founders are:

• the Atameken National Chamber of Entrepreneurs of Kazakhstan;
• the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs;
• the Confederation of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (Employers) of Belarus;
• the Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (Employers) of Armenia; and
• the Kyrgyz Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs.

The EAEU Business Council was set up to expand integration within the Eurasian Economic Union and devise concordant positions on important issues of cooperation and building a single economic space within the EAEU.

EDB Media Center:
+7 (727) 244 40 44 ext. 6147 (Almaty)
+7 (495) 645 04 45 ext. 2732 (Moscow)
e-mail: pressa@eabr.org