Speaking Wednesday at the Eighth International Economic Forum in St. Petersburg, Arkady Volsky, head of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Businesspeople, said that Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan have now come close to economic reintegration and that other former Soviet republics will sooner or later join the club. In his view, this economic alliance has as much potential as the EU, or maybe even more.
According to Mr Volsky, the economies of nine of the former Soviet republics have been growing at an average annual rate of 7 percent in the last five years, whereas the EU's economic growth rate has been a mere 2 percent and the world's, 4.5%.
All talk about the prospect of Russia joining the EU is pointless now, Mr Volsky said. "Let us not deceive ourselves, but face the truth: the issue of Russia and other CIS nations integrating into the European Union, whether as full-fledged or associate members, is not on the agenda now, nor will it be there in the foreseeable future," he emphasized.
In his opinion, the main thing is for the EU and the CIS economic alliance to find common ground. "It is important that the EU and the emerging [economic] union in the East should look for common viewpoints rather than entering into confrontation," Mr Volsky pointed out.
His Ukrainian counterpart, Anatoly Kinakh, believes that time has come to address the issue of economic reintegration between former Soviet republics at the top political level. "We have reached the stage when the efforts and talent of some individual entrepreneurs and managers are insufficient for effective cooperation," Mr Kinakh said. The mismatch of national legislations and the lack of political will have led to a situation where Russia and Ukraine have almost no examples of joint financial or industrial ventures, nor any serious transnational vertically integrated companies, he said. "This leaves us missing out on many things," added the Ukrainian business community leader.
Speaking at St. Petersburg's Economic Forum, the Chair of Belarus' Confederation of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, Nikolai Streltsov criticized the idea of raising energy prices on Russia's domestic market.
The ongoing rise of prices for products of the energy sector and other basic industries will have "huge negative implications" for domestic producers, making their products incompetitive in terms of price, both at home and internationally.
Today's relatively low prices of Russian fuels and energy on the domestic market and in Europe are, in fact, the only advantage the CIS has over competitors.
Vladimir Zhirinosvky, Vice Speaker of the State Duma, or Russia's lower house of parliament, echoed the point made by Messrs. Volsky, Kinakh and Streltsov. Unlike the EU, former Soviet republics have a lingua franca (Russian) and a common currency (the rouble), whose history is much longer than that of the euro.
Boris Pastukhov, Vice President of Russia's Chamber of Industries and Commerce, believes that CIS reintegration is an important factor of economic growth. According to the statistics cited by him at the St. Petersburg forum, twenty-one interstate investment programs are being implemented in the Commonwealth now and over two hundred other projects, worth a total 10 billion roubles (over $300 million), are to be launched soon. But the CIS countries' potential for economic cooperation between themselves remains largely untapped, he remarked. "We have 5 percent of the world's population, 10 percent of the world's industrial potential, 25 percent of the world's basic natural resources. That said, our countries' combined share in world trade is a pathetic 2 percent," Mr Pastukhov said. He stressed the importance for the CIS nations of working together toward socio-economic harmonization and coordinated market reform.
