MOSCOW. (Yury Zaitsev for RIA Novosti) - One of Russia's foreign policy priorities is to intensify political dialogue and economic cooperation with Latin America, which has a large market and is a world leader in agricultural raw materials and foodstuffs.
Russia could supply Latin American countries with high tech products and services.
The outlook for Russia's economic cooperation with Latin America is generally good. Today, it accounts for a mere four percent of Russia's total foreign trade, and this figure could be doubled or tripled. Trade with Brazil, for example, is approaching three billion dollars. In the Soviet times, the record was $835 million, but it only lasted for one year - 1983. At that time, machines and equipment amounted to 60% of Soviet exports there. Today, mineral fertilizer makes up three quarters of Russian supplies to Brazil, Argentina, and Mexico. Equipment features prominently only in trade with Cuba, but these are mainly spare parts for Soviet-made machines.
Cooperation in innovation is negligible. With many countries, it simply does not exist. Russia is not on the list of 25 biggest investors in Chile and Peru, and its investment in Mexico is insignificant. The most promising directions of Russia's cooperation with Latin America are fuels and other raw materials, the power industry, metallurgy, the chemical and petrochemical industry, machine-building, transport, and agro-industrial sector.
Cooperation in space deserves special mention in the field of high technologies. Mexico, Chile, and Argentine launch their satellites with Russian carrier rockets. A Brazilian astronaut went to space on a Russian Soyuz; Brazil is building a modern launch system using Russian blueprints at its Alcantara launch site in the state of Maranhao. Russian experts are helping their Brazilian colleagues to develop effective carriers of payloads into space.
In the fuel-and-energy sector, cooperation and transfer of technologies could be oriented to the introduction of modern methods of prospecting for and monitoring of mineral and organic raw materials resources (space facilities could be used for this purpose among others); increasing the level of their recoverability and development; and construction of reliable and environmentally safe transportation systems. For instance, Russian RUSAL has already privatized one of Guyana's biggest bauxite-producing companies, and invested several million dollars into it to supply Russia with two million tons of bauxites every year. This is an impressive figure for Russia, and even more so for Guyana.
The Russian oil giant LUKoil is trying to gain a foothold in the Latin American fuel-and-energy market. In the power industry, innovation policy could focus on the building and use of combined-cycle plants for electric power stations on gaseous fuel and effective steam power plants based on latest technologies of solid fuel combustion. The Russian electric power company Silovye Machiny (former Energomashexport) has won a bid for the supply of equipment for electric power stations in Mexico, Brazil, and Chile.
Through-cycle technologies, which help save the maximum of resources and energy at all stages, are of particular interest for Latin American countries with advanced metallurgical industry. These technologies will also be effective in the chemical, and petrochemical industries.
Russia's experience in automated design and production, high-accuracy machining, and use of advanced methods of control and fault-detection during the manufacture and operation of components could be applied in machine building.
Technological cooperation may develop in upgrading transportation vehicles, and road-building machines and equipment. Uruguay is currently buying Russian Ural trucks for its army. An Avtovaz assembly plant is operating in Ecuador. Russia is selling helicopters and other aircraft to Mexico, Venezuela, Columbia, and Peru.
Russian experts believe that to develop innovation projects, Russia should establish high-tech joint ventures with Latin American countries in order to test pilot models of cooperation and joint science-intensive production, and to put latest Russian developments to commercial use in the region. Importantly, innovation projects will only be effective if they are based on breakthrough fundamental and applied research, and are guided by commercial considerations from the very start.
Vigorous government support for scientific, technical, and innovation cooperation between Russia and Latin America is an important, if not decisive, precondition for its success. The government should back domestic demonstration projects at international exhibitions, expand the licensing of home technologies abroad, and guarantee transparency of technological exports and imports.
For Russia, Latin America is a very interesting and promising trade and economic partner. Brazil, for instance, is the world's fourth producer of aircraft, and the world's leader in the market of regional and medium-haul planes. It owns 45% of this market. Paradoxically, Russia is purchasing these aircraft from the United States, whereas the U.S. is buying them in Brazil.
Yury Zaitsev is academic advisor at the Russian Engineering Academy.
