RUSSIA-ITALY: TRADE AND ECONOMIC COOPERATION

Russian-ltalian trade and economic contacts have been developing on a new basis over the last several years.

In December 1991 and in January 1994, two countries signed a joint declaration on the basic principles of their relations, as well as a bilateral government statement. Russia and Italy agreed to cooperate with each other and apply previously signed agreements with due account of ongoing changes in the interests of their bilateral relations. Apart from that, the sides intend to fully abide by the commitments stemming from the Helsinki Final Act, the Paris Charter For a New Europe and other CSCE documents.

Italy is one of Russia's major trade and economic partners, ranking third in Europe in terms of bilateral trade turnover. The annual bilateral trade volume stands at around $4 billion.

For its part, Russia exports fuel-and-energy products to Italy (natural gas, crude oil, petroleum products and bituminous coal), as well as metals, timber, machinery (passenger cars, metal-cutting lathes, tools, forging equipment, presses, stamps and ball bearings, for the most part).

In the meantime, Italian firms are actively invading the Russian market (along every conceivable direction). This concerns those fields where Italian industry has scored the greatest breakthroughs, outstripping other nations. Russia gets Italian-made machinery, plant, chemicals, foodstuffs and agricultural produce. Italy supplies to the Russian market a wide range of goods, which were rarely seen there until recently (footgear, knitwear, clothing, furniture, drinks, perfumes, natural sprays, etc.).

We'd like to point out the high level of economic cooperation with Russia and Italy deciding to expand such cooperation in accordance with new programs and initiatives so that the two nations' production structures mutually complement each other. Italy has also voiced its readiness to contribute to the development of Russian market economics.

Several decrees aiming to step up local economic reforms have been issued in Russia not so long ago. Among other things, they have abolished the license and quota system in foreign trade; this is expected to promote business ties in such promising fields as industry; electricity supply; conversion; telecommunications; production, processing, storage and distribution of agricultural produce; science-and-technological cooperation; space research; environmental protection and transportation.

Russia and Italy have agreed to hold regular consultations in order to specify and define new top-priority cooperation avenues, exchange information pertaining to major projects, find additional possibilities for drawing up self-financing projects and cooperate in personnel training. The Italian side had agreed to furnish consultative- technical assistance in organization and-management, vocational training, and business and crediting operations. The Italians also undertake to share their experience as regards small and medium-sized enterprises and private farms. Italy will also continue rendering financial support to Russia's reforms as part of G-7 and European Union activities.

Russia and Italy have agreed to streamline the bilateral treaty base. The signing of the bilateral friendship and cooperation treaty, which has already been initialled, and the creation of the Russian-ltalian council for economic, industrial and currency-financial cooperation are expected to become an important stage in our relations. The aforesaid treaty conforms to the positive essence of Russia-EU relations. The implementation of the recently-signed Russia-EU partnership and cooperation agreement is expected to become a real milestone in the development of their relations.

Russia and Italy have agreed to complete in the near future their bilateral talks on investment-promotion and investment-protection agreements, as well as agreements on avoiding dual taxation and restructuring the Russian debt in accordance with the Paris Club accords. The sides have signed a protocol on joint activities to verify uninsured commercial indebtedness and its subsequent settlement.

The sides also promote the creation of joint ventures in their countries. Nearly 300 Russian-ltalian joint ventures have already been set up in Russia. These ventures operate in the light, sewing, leather- making, food, electrical-engineering, petrochemical and other industries. More than 20 mixed companies involving Russian enterprises and organizations operate in Italy. They trade in machinery, plant, fish products, timber, petroleum products, metals, chemicals, drugs, etc. and deal with tourism and transport-forwarding operations.

In 1993 the Gas-Prom national shareholding company and Italy's ENI Group signed an agreement on cooperation in the gas industry. That agreement serves as a good example of efforts to improve the bilateral trade balance. It can also be seen as a major step toward intensive bilateral industrial and technological cooperation, which is being prodded on by our contacts in the energy field. The implementation of that agreement will contribute greatly to the development and use of Russia's energy resources, helping create new jobs in Italy (via the production of capital and consumer goods and services, with quite a few Italian suppliers taking part in this process).

The G-7's Naples summit is to take place in July 1994. The Russian and Italian governments believe that the forthcoming summit presents an important opportunity for discussing present-day initiatives to facilitateRussia's progress toward market economics.

It is to be hoped that the participation of the Russian Federation President, Boris Yeltsin, in the G-7 summit and his talks with Western representatives, will positively affect international cooperation in general and Russian-ltalian relations in particular.

Source: Russian Information Agency "Novosti"

	This Information System is provided by the University of Toronto Library and the G8 Research Group at the University of Toronto.
	Please send comments to: g8info@library.utoronto. ca Revised:

All contents copyright ©, 1996.University of Toronto unless otherwise stated. All rights reserved.