VITEBSK, 5 January (BelTA) – OOO STS-BETON is the first company to be registered as a resident company of the free economic zone (FEZ) Vitebsk in 2021. The company has come up with an investment project to develop the production of construction materials, the FEZ Vitebsk administration told BelTA.
The company has been established by Belarusian investors and specializes in making cement and concrete. The company will use its own resources and borrowed money to buy new equipment in order to expand the product choice and make new products intended for the civil engineering industry. It will allow racking up the output and penetrating new target markets, including foreign ones.
OOO STS-BETON is the 54th company to reside in FEZ Vitebsk. In addition to registering new companies the free economic zone administration is busy enabling the necessary conditions for existing FEZ Vitebsk residents to implement projects. A considerable amount of organizational work was done in 2020. Solutions were worked out for channeling state budget assets into the development of the engineering and transport infrastructure in FEZ Vitebsk. Vitebsk Mayor Vadim Zaryankin said that the central state budget is supposed to allocate over Br25 million for this purpose. The money will be channeled into building additional power infrastructure and access railways to the main site of the free economic zone on the outskirts of Vitebsk. It will allow creating enterprises within the framework of a vertically oriented woodworking holding company of the Lithuanian company VMG with the total volume of investments at Br100 million at least. OOO VMG WoodArt Company has been registered as a FEZ Vitebsk resident for the sake of implementing the project that provides for starting the production of chipped wood, wood-based panels, plywood, and furniture, including for IKEA Corporation.
In 2021 FEZ Vitebsk's resident company OOO Akitama intends to start processing low-quality commercial timber to make wood fuel granules as well as small timber parts. At least 35 jobs will be created as part of the project. The volume of investments is estimated at about Br62 million. Established with assistance of Irish capital, OOO Solargamma intends to commission the first few photovoltaic power plants at the main site of FEZ Vitebsk in the area of a former military airfield in Vitebsk by the end of 2021. Nearly Br70 million will be invested in the project. At the same site a Canadian investor and the Belmatch company it has created will start a project to make match sticks. A number of other FEZ Vitebsk resident companies will continue pouring investments into their development.
FEZ Vitebsk was established in 1999 and comprises 16 sectors with the total area of nearly 2,800ha. Seven sectors are located in Vitebsk, five in Orsha District, one in Vitebsk District, one in Polotsk District, one in Postavy District, and another one in Novopolotsk. The companies operating in the free economic zone employ about 16,700 people.
