Washington’s Jamestown Foundation,
Germany’s Konrad Adenauer Institute, and the Liberal Institute of Belarus under the auspices of the Minsk
Dialogue. It continues the tradition
of Belarus serving as a neutral regional hub for inter-European diplomacy
following the Russian-Ukrainian
ceasefire agreement. Our delegation
also met with top foreign-ministry
officials on improving understanding
and relations with America.
Belarus has become more independent of Russia since the Ukrainian
conflict, rejected Moscow’s plans to
establish a new airbase on its territory,
and refused to join Russia’s trade war
with Ukraine. Repression is mild,
and the government retains a degree
of popularity for providing stability
and substantial economic growth.
Witness the chaos in neighboring
Ukraine, and how “privatization” of
Russian state industries just ended in
impoverishment and handing them
over to billionaires. People are not
so anxious for possibly chaotic, unjust
“democracy,” as long as their government delivers safety, order, and economic growth. Grigory Joffe, Jamestown’s Belarus expert, writes in “The
Declining Fortunes of the Belarusian
Opposition”, specifically, the government led by President Alyaksandr
Lukashenka, since 1994, was instrumental in propping up Belarusians’
civic identity, ensuring the country’s
stability and security, building up its
infrastructure, pursuing economic
development, boosting the quality of
governance, and even improving living standards — by several measures
exceeding those in Belarus’s culturally close Eastern Slavic neighbors.
BELARUS
I also spoke to students at the Liberal
Institute in a hall called the “John Galt
Club”, named after the famous character in Atlas Shrugged. The institute’s
director is a very dynamic Belarusian
student, Yauheni Preiherman, now
studying for his Ph.D. in England. It
was also he who helped organize the
main conference. He introduced me
to many of the students and I was very
impressed by them.
Belarus imports are mainly composed
of energy resources (oil and natural
gas), raw materials and components,
metal products, raw materials for
chemical industry, machine parts, and
manufacturing equipment. Belarus
has trade relations with more than
180 countries. The nation offers low
costs and is attractive for tourism. It
has 11 impressive war museums, one
in downtown Minsk, another in the
countryside at the old Stalin Line.
Belarus’ Surprising Economic Ratings
Doing Business measures the ease or
More than 50 percent of goods problems of starting and running a
produced in the country are deliv- business in nearly all nations. It was
ered for export. The list of export discussed at the conference and has
products is sophisticated and varied. become a very effective means to
Among the major export commodi- press Third World and former comties of Belarus are refined oil prod- munist governments to facilitate and
ucts, semi-conductors, potash and encourage economic growth.
nitrogen fertilizers, metal products,
busses, heavy trucks, tractors, chemi- Belarus rates surprisingly high on
cal fibers, yarns, tires, dairy and meat several measures. The nation ranks
products, and sugar. The private sec- 12th in the world for “starting a business”, compared to Austria at 106th,
Many formerly communist East Eu- tor is led by exports from its brilliant
services France at 32nd, and Spain at 82nd.
ropean nations are today, surprisingly, information-technology
For “registering a property”, Belarus
more dynamic economically than based at the Minsk High Tech Park
is number 7, Germany 62, and Iremany debt-ridden West European na- free zone. The export of IT services
land, known for its pro-business entions weighed down by years of so- grew from $50 million in 2005 to
vironment, 39. Rated for “ease of
cialist baggage. After the conference $800 million in 2015.
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