“Economic relations between Hungary and Russia are developing transparently, and in accordance with the interests of the Hungarian economy and Hungarian enterprises”, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó declared at a press conference on Tuesday in Budapest.

Mr. Szijjártó said that relations between Europe and Russia are only ruled by disputes publicly, while in the background the Western states have developed a host of collaborations with Russia. “The majority of Russia’s 10 largest trade partners are members of the EU or NATO, and for instance Dutch-Russian, French-Russian and German-Russian trade flow has increased by 23 percent, 40 percent, and 56 percent, respectively, compared to 2017. Meanwhile, smaller countries have become the losers of the punitive measures introduced against Moscow”, he pointed out.

According to the Minister, “Hungary has lost out on 8 billion dollars in export opportunities, but we have successfully managed to assure that cooperation with Russia now contributes to maintaining the growth trajectory of the Hungarian economy”.

“Hungary has an interest in once again becoming involved in the peaceful use of outer space, and accordingly is drawing up an inter-governmental cooperation agreement with Russia on space research projects”, Mr. Szijjártó announced, adding that there is significant Hungarian engineering content linked to the two project already underway. “The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade is providing 570 million forints (EUR 1.73 million) in funding to the Hungarian enterprises and universities participating in these projects”, he explained.

The Minister also praised investment and cooperation on the part of enterprises, from among which he highlighted the tender worth over 1 billion dollars for the manufacturing of 1300 railway cars, which has been won by a Hungarian-Russian consortium, and which is the largest ever commission in the history of Hungarian rail vehicle production.

He also mentioned Hungarian pharmaceutical company Richter, which is constructing a new plant for the production of 80 million boxes of medicine-a-year, enabling it to produce 2 million tablets in Russia each year. Having received its operating and trade licence, medical instruments manufacturer Sanatmetal has also established a facility with an investment of 4 million euros, and Hungarian company Agrofin has also built a feed production plant with an investment of 13 million euros, making it one of the largest distributors of animal feeds on the Russian market, the Minister continued, listing further examples.

“Within the framework of a Hungarian-Russian joint venture, a 4800-ton capacity meat processing plant will also be completed near Moscow by early 2020, and another joint venture company will be opening a milk processing plant close to the Russian capital next year with an investment of 34 million euros”, he added.

The Minister told reporters that Hungary is the 4th largest importer of agricultural seeds on the Russian market, where 60 Hungarian producers have had the opportunity to market their seeds at a total value of 73 million euros. He also mentioned that the ship industry negotiations have also come to a successful close, and Russian companies will be refurbishing Hungarian passenger shipping company Mahart’s hydrofoils.

At the press conference, Russian Minister of Health Veronika Skvrotsova called Hungary Moscow’s highlighted partner in Central Europe, explaining that following an increase of 30 percent over the past little under two years, Russian-Hungarian foreign trade has reached 7 billion dollars, with the level of investment also realising a significant increase.

She said energy, and particularly nuclear energy and the Paks investment project, was a central issue. The Russian Minister declared that intergovernmental negotiations also extend to social issues, and accordingly the parties will, amongst others, be concluding an agreement on the mutual provision of services to their citizens working in the other country.

According to Veronika Skvrotsova, Hungarian-Russian cooperation must still find solutions to several challenges, and accordingly she expects the two countries to maintain extensive and expanding relations in future.

(MTI)