Trade Among SCO Countries Fell 30% In First Half Of 2020 - Kazakh Prime Minister

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 30th November, 2020) Trade among Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) member countries fell by some 30 percent in the first half of 2020, Prime Minister of Kazakhstan Askar Mamin said on Monday.

"Based on the results of six months of this year, the volume of trade within the SCO showed an unprecedented decline. The decline was about 30 percent," Mamin said at an online meeting of the council of heads of government of the SCO member states.

The prime minister said that the trade growth within the SCO was extremely volatile even before the 2020 pandemic, in particular, between 2015-2020. The average growth rate of trade within the SCO between 2014-2019 was only 3.6 percent per year.

According to Mamin, the SCO countries need to study the possibilities for increasing the trade flows, to modernize the infrastructure for trade, and also to focus on ensuring food security.

The 19th meeting of the SCO Council of Heads of Government is held under India's chairmanship for the first time. India is represented by Vice President Venkaiah Naidu. The other participants include prime ministers of Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, as well as the Pakistani parliament's secretary for foreign affairs. The meeting is also attended by representatives of four SCO observer states � Afghanistan, Belarus, Iran and Mongolia � and Turkmenistan as a special guest.