Trade between Namibia and Russia has grown over the years, reaching a peak of over 300 million by the end of 2025.

Building on this long-standing relationship, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Yury Trutnev paid a courtesy call on President Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah.

In 2024, Namibia exported fisheries products worth over N$60 million to Russia, along with grapes and dates valued at about N$24 million.

Imports from Russia, mainly fertilisers and cereals, totalled about N$230 million.

These figures, though, do not reflect the full potential for cooperation between our countries.

Both President Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah and Russian Deputy Prime Minister Yury Trutnev emphasised the need to explore more bilateral and economic opportunities that would be effectively implemented.

"This to me and to us shows the strong relationship between two countries that we continue to strengthen at all times. This 8th administration will continue to forge strong cooperation between our countries and people."

"We brought Russian business representatives. We hope that this visit will be useful and lead to business engagements for further cooperation. Each year our cooperation grows, but this growth is not as significant and is yielding very little numbers."

Russia expressed interest in strengthening cooperation with Namibia, particularly regarding uranium deposits and broader collaboration in the field of nuclear energy.

Meanwhile, the Minister of International Relations and Trade, Selma Ashipala-Musavyi, stated that a lead entity still needs to be identified to coordinate and facilitate private-sector collaboration between the two countries.

"We are very happy that we could bring our two private sectors together to see how they can come together and explore business opportunities on both sides, so we have decided that that was just initial interactions, and the two sectors are now going to continue to interact. We have to identify the entity that will be at the forefront between the two private sectors."

Trutnev and his delegation are in the country for the 11th Session of the Intergovernmental Commission on Trade and Economic Cooperation, co-chaired by Ashipala-Musavyi.