MINSK, 12 January (BelTA) – The latest episode of the documentary series Time Chose Us by the Belarus 1 TV channel explored the reasons why Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko set out on a course to turn Belarus into an IT country in 2017, BelTA reports.
The year 2017 saw a real cryptocurrency boom. There was an explosive growth in the bitcoin value. On 1 January it cost $950, while by the end of the year it hit $20,000. Cryptocurrencies began to be recognized by Wall Street, the world's financial center.
Large exchanges began to issue bitcoin futures. That said, financial regulators around the world poured called water on cryptocurrencies. This market was hardly regulated.
Belarus was one of the first to take cryptocurrencies seriously. At the end of 2017, the Belarusian president signed a groundbreaking document - a decree to promote digital economy. This event was later dubbed a digital revolution, and the document became fully operational in March 2018.
“Belarus is actually becoming the world's first state to offer broad opportunities to use blockchain technology. We are well placed to become a regional center of competence in this area,” Aleksandr Lukashenko said then.
“In 2017, as you remember, the head of state announced a decision to turn Belarus into an IT country. At the same time, we were tasked with updating the legal framework of the High-Tech Park. Thus, the head of state instructed us, the High-Tech Park, to come up with mechanisms to inject new energy into the Park and create new mechanisms to boost its development,” said Deputy Director of the High-Tech Park Administration Kirill Zalessky.
First of all, the emphasis was placed on developing and promoting Belarus' own products, not just implementing outsourcing projects. Thus, the entire year of 2017 was spent crafting a new regulatory legal act - a decree on the development of the digital economy.
“This decree was actually developed by the business community itself. We asked IT companies, founders, directors, everyone involved: what is missing? What regulations need to be passed for your business to grow and thrive in the High-Tech Park, so that you will not need to have presence abroad and can work solely in Belarus? In fact, all the proposals that the business community articulated were taken on board, put on paper and submitted to the head of state. And the president supported all the proposals for the HTP development without exception,” said Kirill Zalessky.
Mining was not considered an entrepreneurial activity. Income earned by individuals from cryptocurrency transactions was not subject to income tax. In 2017, the digital industry got the green light in Belarus.
You can learn more about the big events of our country's history in BelTA's YouTube project How It Was.
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