News

ERR - The London-based magazine Emerging Markets has named Estonian Finance Minister Jürgen Ligi "Finance Minister of the Year for Emerging Europe 2010," citing his ability to steer Estonia's economy "from severe recession to recovery and - against all odds - euro accession."
Responding to the award in an article published on the magazine's website on Saturday, Ligi said the honor was "about Estonia's efforts in general, not mine in particular."

"Estonians take a definite pride in their qualities of calmness and reserve, which they feel qualify them as being ‘Nordic' rather than ‘Baltic'," the magazine wrote. "Similarly, finance ministers are supposed to be the politicians who are best at keeping their head in times of crisis. Jurgen Ligi is just such a figure - unflappable and a man not given to making rash decisions."

Read more: http://news.err.ee/politics/fffff2fd-b3c4-41d5-aec4-8f9105a46831

BNS - Philippe Marini, a French senator, praised the Estonian budget policy in the light of the economic crisis, as Estonia managed to build up reserves during several years before the crisis.

Marini, the main rapporteur in the French Senate, said that France was in a different situation, as since 1958 the state budget had had a surplus only twice since 1958.

At the same time serious work is underway for the improvement of the next year's budget position in France, the state is preparing a pension reform and planning budget cuts, Marini Monday told reporters. He added that the government was firm in carrying out its plans and the extensive people's protests against reform plans were a peculiarity of the French political arena.

Marini said that member of the eurozone had to stick to the pact of stability and growth, which means fitting into the Maastricht criteria. Marini explained that in the situation of crisis countries started to support their economies and this brought fiscal policy out of balance. He added that countries themselves had to add guarantees and help their people.

In Marini's opinion the worst period of the economic crisis was over.

French Budget Minister Francois Baroin said in September that the state was planning to bring the budget shortfall to 2 percent of the gross domestic product. Baroin added that the supreme aim was to bring the French budget nearly into a balance. The forecast for the budget shortfall of of the French budget is 7.8 percent. France has promised to bring the budget surplus to the level of 3 percent by 2013.

BNS - The Finnish company Mirasys, a leading provider of digital CCTV and video surveillance solutions, has opened a representation in the Estonian capital that will be in charge of its Baltic operations.

Mirasys' operations in the Baltic states will be steered by Raul Grigorjev who the company said has more than a decade's experience of security services.

The company has representations in Frankfurt, Bangkok, Barcelona, Johannesburg, Londin, Milan and Paris. Its software controls over 300,000 surveillance cameras across the world.

BNS - Estonian exports of goods at current prices grew by 37 percent and imports by 34 percent year-on-year in August, the statistics office reports.

The growth of the turnover of exports and imports was faster only in May this year.

In August exports of goods from Estonia amounted to 11.1 billion kroons (EUR 711 mln) and imports totaled 12.2 billion kroons. Year on year, exports increased by three billion kroons and imports by 3.1 billion kroons. Trade grew faster only in May this year when exports soared by 39 percent and imports by 46 percent on annual comparison.

The trade shortfall was 1.1 billion kroons, increasing slightly in comparison with August 2009.

Exports to European Union countries amounted to 7.5 billion kroons, accounting for 67 percent of total exports. Compared to the same month last year, exports to the EU grew by 36 percent. Exports to non-EU countries or the so-called third countries increased by 40 percent.

Imports from the EU totaled 10 billion kroons and made up 82 percent of all imports. On annual comparison imports surged from the EU surged by 38 percent. Imports from third countries grew by 19 percent.

The trade gap with the EU was 2.5 billion kroons whereas trade with third countries showed a surplus of 1.4 billion kroons.

Month on month, exports increased by 2 percent and imports by 6 percent in August.

(EUR 1 = EEK 15.65)

BNS - Eesti Logistikaklaster (Estonian Logistics Cluster), a cooperation program of logistics companies, higher schools and specialist associations is now promoting Estonia's logistic location and competition advantages in several cities in China and Vietnam.

Head of Eesti Logistikaklaster Urmas Koiv told BNS that there were meetings with companies operating on the Asian and Northwest Russia course as well as state organizations." We speak about the opportunities of Estonian ports, the railway, the airport, port operators and warehouses, as well as opportunities of creating value added to Estonian products.

In Vietnam representatives of the Logistics Cluster will speak about Estonia in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, or Saigon. In China there will be Estonian road shows in Beijing, Shenzhen and Shanghai.

In Vietnam there will be high-level meetings with the leadership of the country's trade, industry and transport ministers. Besides, there will be meetings with the Vietnamese association of forwarders and the Chamber of Trade and Industry.

Koiv said that nearly 150 potential Vietnamese cooperation partners would take part in seminars and meetings in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi. Among others Eero Pargmae, Deputy Secretary General for Transport of the Ministry for Economic Affairs, Board Chairman of Eesti Raudteee Kaido Simmermann, Commercial Director of the Port of Tallinn Erik Ringma and Board Member of Tallinn Airport Erik Sakkov will take part in a seminar in Ho Chi Minh City.

Koiv said that in China there would be meetings with the world's biggest ocean liners' and logistic companies as well as with representatives of Chinese airlines. On  the Estonian side the Estonian ambassador in China helped create contacts. "We will take part in one of the biggest logistic and transport fairs in Shenzhen in China. There will be a visit to the port of Shanghai together with the Estonian president. It is a very tight program," he said.

In Beijing, Shanghai  and Shenzhen nearly 80 existing and new Chinese cooperation partners will take part in the meetings.

Koiv said that in Asia relations developed very slowly. "Asian partners must be visited for years in order that trust and mutual understanding would develop.

Members of the logistics cluster recently also visited  Kazakhstan and St. Petersburg and in November they would go to the Netherlands, Amsterdam and Rotterdam. "The companies operating at those ports are our important partners," Koiv said.

He added that different people would speak about Estonia at different meetings. "We have no reserves, we have applied all the people, both from the private and the public sectors, for making  the Estonian logistic location better known in the world."

The Logistic Cluster cooperates with the Ministry for Economic Affairs and Communications, the Foreign Ministry and with Enterprise Estonia.

Taking part in the Logistics Cluster program are the Port of Tallinn, Estonian Railway, Tallinn Airport, Sillamae Port, Vopak-EOS, Alexela Logistics, Smarten Logistics, the Association of Estonian Ports, the State Reserves Center, the Paldiski North Port, Esteve Terminal, DBT, Contimer, Bominflot, Tallinn University of Technology and the Mainor High School.

BNS - The British airline Easyjet will start flying between Tallinn and Liverpool from  April 26 next year.

It appears from Easyjet's web page that there will be flights three times a week; on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays.

Easyjet will be flying from Liverpool to Tallinn in the morning and return in the afternoon.

Erik Sakkov, board member of  AS Tallinna Lennujaam (Tallinn Airport), told BNS that extension of Easyjet's  operations in Tallinn showed the company 's interest to offer competition, " This is very important news".

Until today Easyjet has been flying on the Tallinn-London route.

ERR - A forum held at the Tallinn University of Technology on Monday was the first of over a hundred seminars, workshops and other events across the country as part of Entrepreneurship Week, a project designed to help would-be business owners get their ideas off the ground.
Most Entrepreneurship Week events will be taking place in Tallinn, Tartu, Narva and Pärnu, though some will also be hosted in small towns and rural areas.

According to the national support institution for businesses, Enterprise Estonia, 43 percent of Estonian residents would like to have their own business, although only 8 percent actually do, and 5 percent are considering starting one up, ERR television news reported.

Last year more than 13,000 people took part in Entrepreneurship Week events in Estonia, the HEI innovation journal's website wrote.

BNS - The container ship operator Sea Connect will start operating a new line, Rotterdam-Tallinn-St. Petersburg-Rotterdam, from Wednesday.

Currently Tschudi Lines runs a once-a-week connection between Estonia and Rotterdam, which is not sufficient to meet the local market's needs for transit operations, the company said.

The transit time from Rotterdam to Tallinn will be four days, a day or two less than now, whereas the transit time to St. Petersburg will be one day.

Sea Connect is a company based in Lithuania that started business in 2007 and currently operates five container ships. The agent for Sea Connect in Estonia is SCS Estonia OU.

BNS - Statoil Fuel & Retail, the parent company of Eesti Statoil, will set up the group's financial center in Tallinn in October.

The unit that is to function as a center of excellence will provide to companies of the group services like financial asset management, liquidity management, centralized financial asset accounting, and financing.

"In the choice of a suitable location for the group's financial center, several important factors such as advanced financial and IT infrastructures and favorable enterprise and taxation environments spoke for Estonia. The decision was also significantly affected by the adoption of euro in Estonia on January 1, 2011," Statoil Fuel & Retail CFO Klaus-Anders Nysteen said.

In connection with the establishment of the financial center Statoil Fuel & Retail made an additional investment of 270 million euros in its Estonian subsidiary Eesti Statoil that will be used to finance the group's companies in all the eight countries in which it has operations at present. Formation of the financial structural unit will continue in coming months as a result of which a subunit coordinating financial services provided to the whole group will be set up at Eesti Statoil.

Kai Realo from the Estonian subsidiary of the group explained to BNS that Statoil Fuel & Retail is increasing the stock capital of Eesti Statoil by 270 million euros, raising it to 280.8 million euros.

The additional investment covers all the expenses related to forming the team of the financial center, Realo said. In her words, Statoil will gradually hire 5-6 finance specialists during the first year.

Statoil Fuel & Retail, the Norway-based oil and gas group, has an extensive retail trade network consisting of around 2,300 service stations and unmanned filling stations in Scandinavia, Poland, the Baltic states and Russia.

He named Oslo Rygge, Stockholm Skavsta, Dublin, Edinburgh, London Luton, Duesseldorf Weeze and Milan Bergamo as destinations.

Flights to Oslo, Stockholm and Duesseldorf are scheduled to begin on Dec. 13, to Dublin on Dec. 14, to Milan on Dec. 16, and to London and Edinburgh on Jan. 10. Ryanair has bases at all the above-mentioned destinations.

Sale of tickets will start on the website of the carrier on Oct. 1.  

Ryanair expects to carry 300,000 passengers annually on the said routes.

Tamas said the new services should help create 300 new jobs in Estonia in both the hotel and the restaurant business. The tourists arriving by Ryanair are expected to leave around 50 million euros in Estonia annually, he observed.

If Ryanair does well in Tallinn during the first six months new destinations can be expected, he added.

One of the main reasons why Ryanair decided to come to Tallinn was the favorable terms offered to companies launching new flights by the local airport operator, Tallinna Lennujaam, Tamas said.

Tallinna Lennujaam CEO Rein Loik told BNS that easy terms will be in effect for five years. The airport charges of a carrier opening new routes will be 75 percent lower than usual and passenger-related expenses will be approximately 50 percent lower.

Loik added that if at present an airline has to pay the airport 10 euros per passenger the fee will come down to seven euros from  the new year. The airport operator last lowered fees in April.

Tallinna Lennujaam is working with many airlines to bring new flights to Tallinn, Loik said and voiced the hope that the new flight support program will make Tallinn attractive to carriers.

Ryanair expects to carry 73.5 million passengers on international flights this year. Its passenger numbers totaled 65 million in 2009.

The no-frills carrier that is flying to 14 destinations from the Latvian capital Riga served 850,000 passengers there last year. This year's forecast is 900,000-950,000.

The flights the carrier operates out of Lithuania's second-largest city Kaunas number 19. This year's passenger numbers there are expected to exceed one million. Ryanair has a base in Kaunas.