Russian President not satisfied with level of economic cooperation with ASEAN

SOCHI, May 20. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin is not satisfied with the level of economic cooperation with the member-states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and has set the goal to boost it. When speaking at the meeting of leaders of the Association’s countries with participants of the Russia-ASEAN business forum on Friday, Putin said that the common task is to "facilitate rapprochement of the economies, strengthen trade and investment ties and create background for launch of new projects." "Last year the trade turnover between Russia and ASEAN member-states reached $13.7 bln," he said, adding that "this figure looks rather modest compared with other countries of the Asian-Pacific Region, for example the turnover between ASEAN and China tops $80 bln, and the same about our turnover with China." "The current level of investment cooperation is also lagging behind the existing potential," President said. "The total volume of investment is around $11 bln so we all need to think about what should be done to improve the situation and find ways to boost business cooperation," he added. According to Putin, the meeting with representatives of business circles has become the first item in the official program of the forum, "which demonstrates the fact that we’re putting a priority on the development of economic cooperation between Russia and ‘the ten’." "It is worth taking into consideration the huge experience of implementation of joint projects that has been accumulated," President said and mentioned companies from Thailand (invest in Russia’s agriculture industry), Vietnam (oil and gas production) and Singapore and Brunei (innovative sector) as examples. He also said that "Russia's business is investing in mineral production in Indonesia and Myanmar, in high technologies in Malaysia, in peaceful atom in Vietnam and has similar plans for Laos." "We’re convinced that we’re capable of boosting further development of business ties," Putin said and referred to a ‘road map’ prepared by the Russian side, which includes 57 projects on implementation of joint technological and innovative alliances. Read more