OREANDA-NEWS. April 06, 2009. Belarus is interested in cooperation with Brandenburg in the area of power engineering and energy saving, Prime Minister of Belarus Sergei Sidorsky said as he met with Minister-President of German Federal Land Brandenburg Matthias Platzeck, reported the Official website government.by.

Belarus is implementing a large-scale programme to modernize its power engineering facilities and is interested in the German involvement in these energy projects. In particular, the Belarusian side would like to study the German expertise in using alternative energy sources and high-tech in agriculture.

The Belarusian head of government praised the level of dialogue with Brandenburg. “There are many things we can learn, discuss and implement in our country,” Sergei Sidorsky said.

In the conditions of the global financial crisis both countries have to take decisive steps to advance on foreign markets, the Belarusian Premier noted. The recent meeting is to give an impetus to the further joint work and implementation of new projects of Belarus and Brandenburg.

Sergei Sidorsky reminded about his meeting with Matthias Platzeck held two years before. That meeting helped to resolve many issues that hampered the development of the bilateral cooperation. According to the Belarusian head of government, the trade and economic cooperation was in an uptrend during the last two years. The trade between Belarus and Germany exceeded US3 billion in 2008.

Matthias Platzeck believes that trade with Belarus could develop more successfully. He commissioned the businessmen who came with the delegation with a task to discuss it with Belarusian enterprises.

Brandenburg intends to collaborate with Belarus on wind power and bioenergy projects. At present, Germany is heavily investing in the energy reconstruction of buildings. Cooperation in logistics seems promising, too: some Belarusian entrepreneurs have already invested in the establishment of logistic centres in Germany.

Apart from that, German businessmen show interest in the projects in agriculture and food industry.

The administration of Federal Land Brandenburg sees great prospects in the cooperation with Belarus in alternative energy sources. Brandenburg Minister-President Matthias Platzeck told reporters that this topic was discussed at the meeting with Prime Minister of Belarus Sergei Sidorsky.

“We discussed alternative energy sources with our Belarusian counterparts and structured our future cooperation in this area. We have great expertise in this field and are ready to share our experience with Belarus. Alternative energy sources that we use include solar, wind and bio energy. About 30% of energy produced in Brandenburg is generated from wind power. By 2020, 90% of energy is to be received from alternative sources,” Matthias Platzeck said.