At the opening of the October Economic Forum First Deputy Prime Minister Alyaksandr Turchyn said that the main challenge for Belarus today is the need to adapt to technological changes in the world.
Turchyn notes that new technologies have made a number of important items in the state economic policy of past years irrelevant. In particular, the issue of fighting for cheap oil and gas, which used to be a key issue for the Belarusian economy, is no longer relevant.
“Now these issues are no longer critical for the development and survival of the economy. The development of technologies is slowly but steadily making hydrocarbons less relevant. This process is still far from being completed, but no one doubts it will end this way,” said First Deputy Prime Minister.
According to Turchyn, today an intellectual product comes to the fore in economic development.
“Technologies change both life and economy regardless of the state’s desire. The state can either adjust to the needs of progress or ignore it. In the first case, the country’s progress will be accelerated, in the second case it will go past the state, leaving it on the sidelines. But it is impossible to slow down or change these processes. An early understanding of this is probably the main challenge today,” he stressed.
Turchyn notes that if the state policy coincides with technological trends, Belarus demonstrates economic progress. The development of the IT-industry confirms it.
“The growth rate of the High-Tech Park and the IT-industry is much higher than all other sectors and spheres,” said Turchyn. “In fact, we owe the small growth of GDP, which our country has, to the HTP. Today, the IT-industry, in terms of contribution to GDP, has become on par with the agricultural sector, that is, the area that has historically been a specialization of our country”.
In general, my opinion is that the next five-year plan should become digital both in terms of name and content. This presupposes the realization of a fundamental fact: digital technologies change the production, logistics, financial and trade processes not superficially, but essentially,” Turchyn said.
From January to September 2019, Belarus’ GDP grew by 1%.
