Region
30.01.2006
In 2005 resident companies of free economic zone Gomel-Raton implemented 32 import-replacing projects. They invested Br 92.3 billion of their own money and loans in the projects, the FEZ administration told BelTA.
At present FEZ Gomel-Raton produces around 35 kinds of goods, which are not produced in Belarus anywhere. In 2005 the State Import Replacement Programme was expanded with 34 such products as stated by investment projects of 17 FEZ companies.
The source informed, the number of import-replacing projects was expanded with Gomelkabel’s copper enamel-insulated wires and aluminium-steel wires for power transmission lines, packing devices and exposable crockery produced by foreign companies Belcaps, Multipack, Kashtan, Intertapes, and Policup, low voltage equipment by Elektroapparatura, PVC profiles, windows, doors and other building elements made of the PVC (Bekker-System), boilers fuelled by waste wood (Komkont), cubicle switchboards and packet-type switches (Raton) and others.
Home market supplies of import-replacing goods by FEZ resident companies saved around USD 30 million for the state. For example, thanks to Gomelkabel goods the state saved USD 16 million of foreign currency.
The source underlined, great import replacement investments made by resident companies are profitable because the merchandise is in large demand abroad. For example, only 40 per cent of the import replacement goods output is sold on the home market while the remaining 60 per cent is sold in the CIS and non-CIS states.
FEZ Gomel-Raton was created by President of the Republic of Belarus Decree #93 of March 2, 1998 for 50 years. It is a complicated facility divided into industrial, export and free customs areas. As of early January 2006 there were 36 resident companies in the zone, including 22 ones with foreign investments.