Turkmenistan, Ashgabat, July 30 / Trend H. Hasanov /
Turkmenistan and Russia will discuss iissues of economic cooperation during the sixth meeting of the Turkmen-Russian intergovernmental commission, to be held in Moscow on July 30-31, an official Turkmen source said on Monday.
A Turkmen delegation will be headed by Rashid Meredov, deputy chairman of the Cabinet of Ministers and Foreign Minister of the country.
Russia and Turkmenistan are the largest natural gas exporters in the CIS. Russia ranks third in Turkmenistan's total turnover for the first three months of 2012 and the turnover amounted to $1.235.41 billion.
Cooperation in the field of the fuel and energy complex is a strategic direction in relations between the two countries.
Turkmen gas is supplied to Russia via the Central Asia - Centre gas pipeline
(CAC) through Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan. Gazprom (Russia) is a buyer. It signed an agreement on gas supplies with Turkmenistan for 25 years in 2003.
At present, the CAC does not operate at full capacity. Russia has reduced gas procurement up to 10 billion cubic meters as a result of the global recession since 2010, which is four times less than in 2008. Russian companies are involved in the development of hydrocarbon resources of Turkmenistan. Russian Itera and Zarubezhneft work on one of the blocks in the Caspian Sea shelf under the production sharing agreement.
About 180 joint ventures are represented on the local market, Russian companies, including Power Machines, Itera and others are involved in the construction of numerous industrial and social facilities, roads and communications.
The partnership between Russia and Turkmenistan is steadily growing. It has reached a qualitatively new level, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in his message to Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov.