The countries on Tuesday this week signed an agreement which officially opens talks on the free trade deal. The agreement mandates the country representatives to enter into a formal process from January 2011, a communiqué from the meeting reads.
-This is very important for Norway, the country’s Minister of Trade and Industry Trond Giske told NTB.
-In my opinion, this is now the most important process in EFTA, he added, E24.no reports.
In 2009, Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan together were EFTA’s 5th most important export destination and 4th largest import source outside the EU, with total merchandise trade amounting to 6.2 billion USD in that year, EFTA’s website informs.
Originally, the free trade agreement was to be negotiated only with Russia. However, after Russia’s entry into a customs union with Kazakhstan and Belarus, also these countries had be included in the talks.
The European Free Trade Association (EFTA) is a free trade organisation which today includes four countries – Norway, Iceland, Switzerland and Lichtenstein. With the exception of Switzerland, all the EFTA countries are part of the European Union Internal Market through the Agreement on a European Economic Area (EEA).
From the EFTA side, the meeting in Geneva was lead by Johann N. Schneider-Ammann, Federal Councillor and Head of the Federal Department of Economic Affairs of Switzerland. From the Russian side, Minister of Trade and Economic Development Elvira Nabiullina attended.
