CIS Economic Council Discusses Agreements & Future Cooperation

On March 2, the 77th meeting of the Economic Council of the Commonwealth of Independent States was held in Moscow.

The members of the CIS Economic Council approved the drafts of a number of documents that will be submitted to the Council of CIS Heads of Governments. These include drafts of the Agreement on the Formation and Development of the Intellectual Property Market of the Commonwealth States, the Agreement on the Distribution of Documents on Interstate Standardization, the Concept of Cooperation of the CIS Countries in the Field of Innovative Energy Development, the Development of Advanced Energy Technologies and the Plan of Priority Actions for its Implementation, and the Joint Action Package for CIS countries on the Prevention and Control of Rabies until 2025.

The Economic Council decided to form a high-level working group of ministers of the Economy of the Commonwealth States for further work on the draft Agreement on Free Trade in Services and approved the schedule of its meetings for 2018.

Participants of the meeting approved the Program of Scientific Research on the Kazakhstan Materials Science Tokamak for 2018-2020.

The Economic Council ruled that the Russian Federal Center for Nuclear and Radiation Safety would be given the status of “basic organization” of the CIS member states on the management of spent nuclear fuel, radioactive waste and the decommissioning of nuclear and hazardous radiation facilities.

Having considered the submission of the Jury of the competition for the Prize of the Commonwealth of Independent States in 2017 for achievements in the field of quality of products and services, the Economic Council decided to award the titles of laureates and diplomats of this prize to a number of enterprises and institutions of the Commonwealth countries.

In addition, a number of budget, financial and organizational issues were discussed.

The next meeting of the CIS Economic Council is scheduled to be held this June in Moscow.

At the meeting of the Economic Council, the vice-premiers and ministers of the CIS countries discussed cooperation in several sectors. The main topics at the forum were the development of free trade on the territory of the Commonwealth, improvement of the intellectual property market, and innovative cooperation. Within the framework of scientific research, the number of participating countries and financing of the energy technology of the future - thermonuclear fusion - was approved, including the future thermonuclear reactor in Kazakhstan.

Dimitri Dolaberidze