From Jan. 23-26, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov toured three nations of the Maghreb — Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia — for the first time since November 2005. The negotiations revolved around the issues of trade, economic cooperation and conflicts in Libya, Syria and Western Sahara.

The visit to Algeria — the sixth for Lavrov — was central to his North African tour. It took place a week before the session of the Russian-Algerian inter-governmental commission for trade and economic cooperation. The timing was a mere coincidence, though a symbolic one, as Algerian Foreign Minister Abdelkader Messahel pointed out during the final press conference. The ministers took their time discussing the prospects of economic partnership and agreed to arrange a negotiation venue for entrepreneurs from their countries. The economic interaction between Russia and Algeria appears to be developing: Since 2015, bilateral trade has doubled, reaching $4,6 billion in 2017. However, two-thirds of this sum consist of weapons and military equipment turnover, including the so-called associated products: engines, fuel, etc. For a partnership to be called “close,” mainly selling military hardware is not enough.

Russia has recently started to compete for the Algerian wheat market, traditionally controlled by France. Russian and Algerian quality standards for the grain vary and it is not clear whether Algeria is willing to adopt new ones. As for now, the sides agreed on a test supply.

Another highly relevant topic is the future of Gazprom’s projects in Algeria. In November, the corporation decided to give up the exploitation of two oil fields — Zamle al-Rekkeb and North Zamle al-Rekkeb — due to low economic viability. In general, oil exploitation projects in Algeria have turned out to be unprofitable for Russian business. The prospects of Russia’s participation in the development of the Rourd Sayah and North Rourd Sayah gas fields are still unclear. Currently, the main question is whether these projects are supposed to continue in any form. If not, Russia and Algeria will have to lean toward other directions of energy cooperation. Here, it is mostly up to Algerians to choose a strategy — either to rely on the discovery of new gas fields or to develop alternative energy sources, giving up the commodity-based economic model. In any case, Russia is ready to support the North African nation. For now, however, the dynamics of the energy industry mostly revolve around the bilateral coordination of oil prices and gas markets. Moscow also backed Algeria’s suggestion to create a national gas technology research center under the patronage of Gas Exporting Countries Forum.