COVID-19 pandemic takes toll on investment activity in Great Stone Industrial Park

<p> MINSK, Jul 31 - PrimePress. The COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic had a significant impact on the investment activity of potential investors in the Chinese-Belarusian Industrial Park Great Stone (Minsk Oblast). Deputy Director General at Great Stone Industrial Park Development Company Sergey Vaitekhovski made a statement to this effect during an online conference on July 31. </p> <p>   </p> <p> “The pandemic has had a significant impact, primarily on the investment activity of potential investors - the closure of borders has greatly contributed to this. In January 2020, 30 companies were making real plans to invest in the park this year, many of them put their projects on hold. Since the beginning of the year, eight companies have been registered as park residents, if seven more join the ranks before the end of the year, it will be a very good result,” said Vaitekhovsky. </p> <p>   </p> <p> He said that the pandemic made it difficult to promote the park itself: while in 2019 the park was visited by 497 delegations of several thousand people, this year the intensity of contacts has decreased by five times. This activity had to be compensated by holding online events for different regions. </p> <p>   </p> <p> “In January-July 2020, we have concluded more deals year-on-year on the lease of industrial premises and the lease of land plots - we have increased by 4.5 thousand metres and 4.5 hectares of leased land plots,” said Vaitekhovsky. </p> <p>   </p> <p> He said that residents are seeing a downward trend in demand for finished products, raw materials and supplies are becoming more difficult to purchase, the delivery time of components has doubled, and labour safety costs have increased. </p> <p>   </p> <p> “Advanced companies have started to develop new types of products, first of all medical products – high-grade protective masks, bacterial and virus filters, plastic protective helmet masks. Investors’ preferences have changed: previously they were in the field of mechanical engineering, now it is directed to projects for the production of medical devices: four companies from China, the Czech Republic, Belarus and Russia have come to implement projects in these industries,” said Vaitekhovsky. </p> <p>   </p> <p> He added that production of various remote control systems for medicine as well as electric transport have become popular areas for park residents. The Great Stone is already assembling supercapacitors for electric buses and has begun manufacturing electric buses. </p> <p>   </p> <p> The China-Belarus Great Stone Industrial Park is located in the vicinity of Minsk National Airport on the area of 112.5 sq. km. </p> <p>   </p> <p> The special privileged legal regime of the park is valid until 2062. The Great Stone Industrial Park stakes on the development of electronics, biomedicine, fine chemistry, engineering. The declared amount of investment for residents is at least $5 million (at least $500,000 in the case of a research project or if the project is implemented within the first three years). The land in the park can be sold and owned as private property. Companies from 15 countries with more than US $1 billion in declared investments are registered as park residents. End </p>

2020-08-01

Primepress