CIS ready to switch to national currencies

21 марта 2022
CIS is ready to switch to settlements in national currencies. This will help to avoid dependence on dollar and the euro in trade, said Deputy Prime Minister of Belarus Igor Petrishenko after a meeting of the CIS Economic Council, held in Moscow. The sanctions of the West against Belarus and Russia have also affected payments within the Commonwealth. Therefore, the Interstate Bank of the CIS has adopted a special mechanism, allowing businesses to most comfortably switch to accounts in national currencies. That is, each country will decide which money to work with, taking into account the level of trade turnover between the states.

Igor Petrishenko, Deputy Prime Minister of Belarus: 

“This topic is relevant for us because last year the trade turnover of Belarus within the Commonwealth increased by 37%, and the share of CIS countries in the trade is more than 60%. Together with Russia, we will actively use the resources of the CIS Interstate Bank to carry out settlements. We also discussed strengthening the production cooperation, removal of barriers in mutual trade, and technical regulations. Most importantly, we need greater cooperation between the CIS and Eurasian Economic Union integration formats. Today we also need to increase the production cooperation and develop new logistics chains. All this will allow the CIS countries to more actively protect their interests.”