Russia seeks to promote agricultural goods to EU market

Russian Agricultural Minister Alexei Gordeyev said on Saturday that Russia intends to promote production of its agrarian companies to the EU market, despite obstacles put by Brussels. “Today, Russia has got exactly that ecologically clean, natural and biologically valuable for the health of the people products which are in demand of European consumers,” the minister told Itar-Tass. “I believe we have a real possibility to enter the world markets,” Gordeyev stressed. “We are ready and we shall work with the European Union, although that market is noted for high import duties, subsidies as well as a policy of tough protectionism, which makes honest competition impossible,” the Russian minister emphasized. Gordeyev leads a heavyweight Russian delegation to a major international agro-industrial exhibition Green Week, which takes place in Berlin. Focusing on the expansion of the European Union, the minister for agriculture noted that Russia would lose up to 500 million euros with the loss of agrarian markets of the countries, which joined the European Union in May 2004.