Translation and subtitles by Scott Humor

Post and video in Russian language.

Russia is on the edge of big changes. So big, perhaps, that were not seen for an entire modern period of existence of our state. Because of large-scale administrative reforms, Moscow will no longer be the only center of interests, and the country will be divided into 14 macro-regions. About all this and more in our today’s issue.

The time of development

In September, the government will decide on a proposal to allocate 14 macro-regions each of which will have at least 1 large center of economic growth, as well as infrastructure facilities that provide access to international markets or major transport corridors. All this is intended to ensure economic growth and smooth an inequality in the regions.

It is the inequality of regional development that has become the main reason for this reform. Today, many cities and regions are loosely linked not to each other but to Moscow, and as a result there are huge disparities in the development of the territories. For this reason, the active population from province tends to move to the capital or St. Petersburg, which leads to new problems such as an environmental degradation in Metropolitan areas, and brain drain of province, which further reinforces existing inequality.

The idea of the reform is to create at least 14 centers of attraction for people and capital in the country. The project outlines the contours of the macro-regions, each of which will specialize in certain areas, be it mining, manufacturing, metallurgy and so on. State support will be provided based on the needs of each and the specialization of a particular macro-region. they have been designed to provide absolutely everyone with equal access to the transport infrastructure, thus reducing the country’s excessive dependence on Moscow.

In addition, this consolidation will reduce number of state workers and generally improve the quality of public administration. It is noteworthy that such system operated in the USSR and even in the Russian Empire. We will continue the story immediately after the brief news.

 

Time of news

Russia’s first production of dimethyl ether with investments of 650 million rubles started in the Nizhny Novgorod region. This production is also unique, because it uses processes developed and patented domestically.

At the Kazan CHP-1 ahead of schedule started operating a new power unit worth more than 15.5 billion rubles.

A new plant for motor-homes production started operating in the Moscow region.

A new production of crushed dolomite stone worth 500 million rubles started work in the Sverdlovsk region.

The Tver region put into operation a new dairy plant worth about 3 billion rubles.

The Samara region opened a modern shop of refining, deodorization and packaging of vegetable oil with an investment of about 2 billion rubles.

In the Vologda region – a new cheese making factory.

A new greenhouse complex opened in the Sakhalin region.

In Kamchatka, – a new fish processing plant.

 

Economy time

It was Dmitry Mendeleev who among other things was an excellent economist, who proposed 14 major economic regions in the Russian Empire.  The same practice was used in the Soviet Union, also back then the number of economic areas varied depending on the tasks of five-year plans. Now we need to rebuild the regions based on needs of the modern economy. Particularly, this strategy provides for the development of settlements and sea ports along the Northern Sea route. The Arctic will be of great importance and will soon become a center of attraction for citizens, since the mineral extraction projects are shifting beyond the Arctic circle, especially including ultramodern ones, and at the same time the ice continues to retreat at a record pace.

The strategy of spatial development is well combined with the planned investments in transport infrastructure, which we talked about in our past issues. The task is not only to create new centers of economic growth, but also to connect the country with new routes and make these centers accessible to all citizens of the country. Moscow should cease to be the most attractive place to live and work in the eyes of compatriots and everyone could choose a region to their liking, without losing in salaries and in expected level of comfort of the urban environment.

Of course, the task is very ambitious. In fact, we are talking about the recolonization of our own territories. This will certainly be reflected in the culture – new romanticism of mega-constructions, affordable travels, new hopes and opportunities will completely change the cultural needs of people.

However, an implementation of the project will inevitably encounter resistance from some of the regional elites, as well as inertia of bureaucracy. Here the government will need to show great will and determination in order to reform the system without destroying the state itself. This will not be possible without seriously renewed personnel, which in turn exacerbates the issue of finding new managers, which is already underway, in particular, through the project “Leaders of Russia”.

Corruption also could become a drag on the implementation of plans. Let’s talk about this in more detail.

 

Anti-corruption

A corruption is usually mentioned in connection with high-profile crimes, but the fight against it goes unnoticed by of the public. Therefore, some citizens have this impression that there is no fight against corruption. meanwhile, the state without excess noise grinds down corrupt officials. Currently, the law enforcement investigates more than 131,000 criminal cases of corruption. However, today, if a person who has committed a crime of small or medium gravity for the first time pays compensation for the damage and otherwise made amends for the damage caused by their crime, their are exempt from criminal liability. Thus, this year alone, the state managed to return 35 billion rubles, and another 18 billion rubles were seized.

Over the past three and a half years, 4.5 thousand law enforcement officers, more than 400 deputies of the regional and municipal level, as well as almost 3,000 officials of the state authorities, most of whom are heads of municipalities and local administrations, have been convicted of corruption.

Afterword

All the news of our latest issues testifies to one important and positive fact – strategic planning is coming back to Russia. Of course, in today’s market conditions, such planning has its own boundaries, but we see that the state has begun to set clear guidelines for designing the future of the country. And how good it will turn out depends on all of us. Keep a healthy optimism and find a useful case, then we will succeed.

We wish you a good and cheerful week. Links to sources and the text of the release are found in the description of the video. Subscribe to our channel, watch us on TV and be sure to share this video with your friends.

 

P.S. As you might noticed, the video and subtitles are not synced.  I spent about two hours translating the post and about three hours trying to sync subtitles, with no success. I’m looking for an assistance of someone who would be able to sync my translations with videos. You don’t need to know Russian language to do this.