China, Russia should interact in a more cooperative way: Merrill Lynch

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The China-Russia friendship has reached a new high as this year marks the 70th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic ties between the two countries.

Vladimir Osakovsky, economist for Russia and CIS countries at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, regarded the interaction between China and Russia as "critically important," suggesting that the two countries should interact in a more cooperative way rather than a more competitive way.

"Obviously, China and Russia have lots of interaction. In the global geopolitical and market-economic context, both countries need each other," the economist said.

Vladimir Osakovsky, economist for Russia and CIS countries at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. /CGTN Photo

For the past few years, "Russia has been very focusing on the stabilization of macroeconomy to (adapt to) the new environment of much lower global oil prices," Osakovsky stated.

However, as the strategy framework over the past five years has been changed quite dramatically, the economist claimed that the connectivity of Russian economic performance to the volatility of oil prices is actually much lower than it used to be.

He noted that economic growth, rather than stabilization, is increasingly becoming the top priority for Russian authority, which weighed on the significance of China-Russia cooperation.

Russia's natural gas producer Novatek just signed LNG agreement with China's Sinopec. Osakovsky acknowledged that the oil sector is still important for the Russian economy, "that basically the way [that] Russia is."

And from his perspective, Russia can complement Chinese economic growth by resources, particularly on the issue of energy security.

"Russian presence in Chinese market could be higher. That offers quite a significant upside for export growth from Russia to China," Osakovsky added, further advising the country to improve its business climate.