Moldova’s foreign trade with EU countries increases by over 15 per cent

Chisinau, 03 August /MOLDPRES/ – The volume of Moldovan imports and exports to the European Union (EU) countries has increased in the first five months of 2017 to $1.4 billion, up by 15 per cent over the similar period of 2016.

The economy and infrastructure ministry’s communications and public relations department has stated that exports of goods to the countries of the EU exceeded the level in January – May 2016 by 15 per cent and amounted to $542 million. The EU share rose to 63.2 per cent of total exports. The main partners of the Republic of Moldova in the field of export are Romania, Italy, Germany, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, Bulgaria, Poland and France.

The imports of goods from the EU countries amounted to $877 million, by 17 per cent more than in January – May 2016. The share of imports from the EU has increased to 49 per cent.

The Ministry of Economy and Infrastructure (MEI) also notes a major increase in the export of cereals to European countries, especially wheat. The wheat deliveries to the Community market have reached 147 thousand tons compared to the established quota of 75 thousand tons. Moldova has used 63 per cent of the EU's preferential quota of 130 thousand tons, barley 34 per cent of the total 70 thousand tons, sugar 56 per cent of the total 37 thousand tons, 15 pe rcent corn sugar out of a total of 1500 tons.

The results of the actions undertaken by the responsible institutions in the first half of 2017 were presented in the Report on the Implementation of the Moldova-EU National Action Plan 2017-2019 on the Economic Competence Areas of the Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area. In the first six months of 2017, "a series of progresses have been registered which allowed the approximation of the national legislation to that of the European community, as well as creation of favorable conditions for commercial and economic activity for the economic agents in the country".

In the first semester, the national institutions responsible for the management of the fields of standardization, metrology and accreditation adopted 1784 European standards and canceled other 1965 Moldovan standards conflicting with European ones or technologically outdated. Up till present, more than 16,000 standards were adopted by the Republic of Moldova, taking over the European ones, out of a total of 25,000 standards set by the European Committee for Standardization.

(Reporter V. Bercu, editor A. Raileanu)