China Township Enterprise Co., Ltd. (CTEC) became the 100th enterprise from the People’s Republic of China registered on the Belarusian Universal Commodity Exchange (BUCE). At the initial stage, the company intends to use the exchange trades to purchase woodworking products that account for almost 90% of the Belarusian exports to China via BUCE.

«As a result of exchange transactions in January-September 2022, Belarusian goods to the tune of 27 million USD were sold to the Chinese market, including more than 24 million USD worth of sawn timber — mainly edged boards made of softwood. In China, our timber is widely used in the construction industry and for the manufacture of wooden containers, but due to the slowdown in the Chinese economy, there has been some decrease in demand in recent months due to the slowdown in the Chinese economy. Now the situation is gradually leveling off, which has a positive effect on the activity of Chinese buyers. Therefore, from October 26 we are planning to resume the practice of holding special export trading with delivery in containers to the end consumers in China. Enterprises of the Ministry of Forestry have already submitted offers for 8 thousand cubic meters of sawn timber, but, of course, this is not the final figure, since the acceptance of offers is still in progress. Moreover, a number of large private woodworking companies announced their intention to participate in the upcoming trading session. Thus, we expect to accumulate a sufficient volume of supply to get Chinese buyers interested and decide to participate in the trades,» BUCE press service said.

It is noteworthy that besides sawn timber, unrefined rapeseed oil and skimmed milk powder were also supplied to China this year. The total sum of transactions exceeded 3 million USD. Taking into account that buying and selling agricultural products is among CTEC’s core activities in China, it is possible that in the future the company will engage in agricultural trades on BUCE as well.