SCOTTISH exports, imports and wider business links with Russia could be affected to a greater degree as deepening Nato sanctions look set to bring reciprocation from Moscow.

Views on imposing further sanctions on Russia by locking down the international payments network for 11,000 banks, Swift (the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication) vary amid concerns related to its overall efficacy and impact on other users.

However, it is largely agreed Swift sanctions will be at least some help. 
Russian businesses operating in the North Sea and Russian access to Scottish oil are also under review, a matter raised by Alistair Carmichael, MP for Orkney and Shetland.

The UK Department of International Trade’s trade and investment update from February 18 places trade in goods and services, exports and imports, between the UK and Russia at £15.9 billion for the year to the end of quarter three, an increase of 28.7 per cent or £3.5bn from previous year. Exports to Russia amounted to £4.3bn, imports £11.6bn.

The Herald:

Scotch whisky exports to Russia, according to the Scotch Whisky Association, were worth £28 million last year, just inside the top 10 markets by volume.

Swift sanctions could potentially impact payments across a variety of transactions.

No matter what happens, businesses will face further pressures as tit-for-tat measures are expected to continue.

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon and Prime Minister Boris Johnson back cutting Russia off from the Swift system.

The Herald: Ukrainian servicemen sit atop armoured personnel carriers driving on a road in the Donetsk region.(AP Photo/Vadim Ghirda)Ukrainian servicemen sit atop armoured personnel carriers driving on a road in the Donetsk region.(AP Photo/Vadim Ghirda)

In a terrifying situation with chilling echoes of the events at the start of the Second World War, as Ukraine is handing out Kalashnikovs to its citizens, Artis Pabriks, Latvia’s deputy prime minister, starkly calls to fellow Nato members: “If you are not ready to spill blood yourself, at least spill money now.”

As some including Germany appeared to hesitate on Swift, Ms Sturgeon said: “If the current situation doesn’t make the maximum possible sanctions – including exclusion from Swift – necessary and urgent, it’s hard to imagine what would. This is not a time for half measures.”

Russia’s invasion of the Ukraine is also set to push UK inflation higher for longer, economists have warned, with a particular impact on fuel and food prices.

There were concerns over one interpretation of the UK’s departure from the European Union, as business editor Ian McConnell identifies in his Called To Account column.

“Even by the incredible standards of the arch-Brexiters, when it comes to stubborn refusal to face up to the realities of their folly, Jacob Rees-Mogg went truly above and beyond,” he writes.

The newly installed Minister For Brexit Opportunities And Government Efficiency declared he thought “the evidence that Brexit has caused trade drops is few and far between” while British Chambers of Commerce called last week for “urgent steps” from the Johnson administration as it published a survey of more than 1,000 businesses which highlighted a raft of problems with the UK’s post-Brexit trade deal with Europe.

Also this week, a Scottish firm that plans to turn disused mines into renewable energy generation plants has won £1m UK Government backing, and, in banking, at a time when UK households are gripped by an ever-worsening cost-of-living crisis, a report revealed details of a 44 per cent rise in one bank’s bonus pool to nearly £300m for 2021.