Western exports to Russia’s neighbors soar in 2022

Western countries have sharply increased exports to Russia’s neighbors against the background of a record reduction in trade with Russia, follows from the February report of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD). Exports of EU countries in May-July 2022 compared to the averages of the same pre-Covid periods in 2017-2019 decreased by 56% in the direction of Russia and by 39% in the direction of Belarus. At the same time, exports to Kyrgyzstan increased by 84%, by 72% to Armenia, by 21% to Tajikistan, by 19% to Georgia and by 14% to Kazakhstan, follows from the data of the organization. The EBRD suspected that this trend is associated with economic ties with Russia that are undesirable for Western countries.

The EBRD does not give absolute values, since last spring the FCS stopped publishing information on foreign trade. The volume of trade between Russia and the EAEU countries at the end of 2021 amounted to $46 billion, of which about half is occupied by Belarus. Russia’s total trade turnover with all countries that year amounted to $800 billion. Trade with the EAEU thus accounted for less than 6%.