On July 17, during their meeting at the Kazan Kremlin, Tatarstan President Rustam Minnikhanov and Head of the Republic of Karelia Aleksander Hudilainen Tatarstan and Karelia signed an agreement on trade-economic, scientific-technical, social and cultural cooperation.

To the point, the delegation of the Republic of Karelia led by Aleksander Hudilainen is on a two-day working visit to Kazan (July 16-17, 2014). Members of the delegation got acquainted with the activities of some innovation centers and industrial sites in Kazan, including Khimgrad technopolis, IT-park, KAI-Laser, etc.

Welcoming the guests, Rustam Minnikhanov thanked them for their visit and said that it was agreed with Aleksander Hudilainen that Tatarstan delegation will pay a return visit to Karelia at the end of 2014 or the beginning of 2015. Tatarstan President also reminded that the previous agreement on cooperation with the Republic of Karelia was signed in 1995 and required updating. We need to establish working groups to discuss the implementation of the agreement signed today, and set an action plan under the Agreement in the near future, Rustam Minnikhanov said.

We are very interested in promoting our products, goods and services to other Russian regions, Tatarstan President continued. For Karelia, in particular, we can provide engineering products, including KAMAZ heavy trucks, black oil, fuel, etc. Karelia, in its turn, supplies timber, building materials, including crushed stone, cellulose to Tatarstan. We need to expand this range of products, Rustam Minnikhanov said.

Then, he briefly told about the socio-economic situation in Tatarstan, noting the most important sectors for the economy and the so-called points of the development, which are oil production and refining, engineering, automotive components, production of helicopters and shipbuilding.

Issues of training of personnel for the economy and industry, as well as further modernization of higher education were also discussed at the meeting. In particular, Rustam Minnikhanov said that Russian-German Technical University will be established at Tupolev Kazan State Technical University in Kazan this year.

Aleksander Hudilainen, in his turn, said that a new concept of the Strategy for Socio-Economic Development of the Republic of Karelia up to 2020 was developed, adding that the republic has great potential, which is not used to its full extent. We have an understanding of what the economy of Karelia will be based on in the future, he said. Among the most promising sectors, he called logging, fish farming and tourist sector.

At the end of the meeting, Rustam Minnikhanov and Aleksander Hudilainen answered questions from journalists.

For more details, please see the press-release.