Antonina Levashenko: "The development of the SCO depends on the establishment of a common payment system and the removal of barriers to data exchange."

Noting that Russia's trade turnover with SCO countries has grown by approximately 1.5 times over since 2022, Antonina Levashenko has identified the main objectives, such as promoting mutual trade and investment, developing land and sea corridors, switching over to settlements in national currencies and creating a regional payment and settlement mechanism. "The latter requires the development of a payment system that will be recognized and serviced by the SCO countries’ financial institutions," the expert noted.

According to Antonina Levashenko, another set of priorities is cooperation in the digital economy, energy, green industry, artificial intelligence, science and education, that is, areas enshrined in the SCO Development Strategy till 2035. However, the expert notes that to achieve these goals, a number of systemic issues must be addressed:

• Simplification of data exchange. “Different understandings of ‘data’ and the procedures for protecting it between countries hinder the development of B2B exchange, which is key to the development of innovation,” the expert said. Antonina Levashenko pointed to barriers associated with data localization requirements being in place in Russia and China.
• Standardization of artificial intelligence. “We need uniform standards for the risks of AI systems, uniform rules for labeling content created by generative AI to develop a common AI market.”
• Cooperation in the field of rare earth metals. "This is important both for the development of AI technologies and the speeding up of decarbonization of the global economy," the expert specified.

According to Antonina Levashenko, the success of Russia's participation in the SCO in 2025 will be judged by the agreements concluded in the sectors of trade and settlements, as well as the launch of joint infrastructure and energy projects.