In the past six months Bashkiria exported almost a quarter of a billion dollars' worth of goods to Netherlands

The Netherlands is Bashkiria's biggest trade partner, said Boris Kolbin, head of Bashkiria's Ministry of Industry, Foreign Relations and Trade, at a meeting of the ministry board.

The RIA Novosti correspondent reports that the minister said that Bashkiria exported 220 million dollars' worth of goods to the Netherlands in the past six months. China ranks second in the volume of trade, with Bashkiria having delivered to it goods worth more than 130 million US dollars since the beginning of the year. Bashkiria exports considerable amounts of goods to Germany ($83.8 million), Italy ($69.4 million), the Virgin Islands ($37.5 million), Switzerland ($34 million) and the USA ($32 million).

As far as imports to Bashkiria go, the leader is Germany which since the beginning of the year has delivered goods worth $25 million. A lot of commodities are imported from Cuba (worth $17 million), from Italy ($16 million), and from China ($14 million).

The republic's overall foreign trade totaled more than 1 billion US dollars in the first six months of the year.

Bashkiria also actively cooperates with the CIS countries and, above all with Kazakhstan, with that republic ranking first both in exports and in imports -- $47.6 million and 23.6 million, respectively.