Deputy Agriculture Minister and parliamentary State Secretary István Nagy and Deputy Minister of Agriculture of the Russian Federation Yelena Astrakhantseva met in Moscow on 3 July to discuss the current status of agriculture and food industry cooperation, and possibilities for future cooperation.

During the negotiations, Mr. Nagy stressed that the goal of the Ministry was to tighten agricultural cooperation in areas that fall outside the scope of the food embargo, and indicated that increasing the exports of Hungarian food industry products is of key importance to Hungary. Furthermore, facilitating relations and cooperation between research centres is also in our interests and one of our goals.

The Deputy Ministers welcomed the development of bilateral relations within the field of agriculture and agreed to hold further consultations in the interests of enabling each other’s agricultural products to reach their markets, while taking into account the opportunities currently available by law. They agreed to reinforce cooperation within the fields of seed production and aquaculture.

The Russian Federation is one of Hungary’s most important strategic partners, and accordingly Hungary continues to have an interest in expanding agricultural cooperation between the two countries, an important element of which is boosting exports of products that are not affected by the embargo. Our goals are achieving success in view of the fact that bilateral trade flow between the two countries has increased this year in comparison to recent years.

Hungarian agricultural enterprises have increased their presence in Russia recently. In the first week of July, one such company will be officially inaugurating a meat plant capable of processing 400 tons of meat-a-day in Sverdlovsk County, while another Hungarian company has begun the realisation of a 200 square metre spice mixing plant and storage facility in Moscow County. Investment and projects on the part of other Hungarian enterprises can also be expected.

(Ministry of Agriculture Press Office)