Meeting with Government members
Vladimir Putin held a meeting with Government
members on support measures for various sectors and other
current issues.
January 27, 2016
14:00
The Kremlin, Moscow
At a meeting with Government members.
The meeting began with a report,
at the President’s request, from Healthcare MinisterVeronika Skvortsova on the epidemiological situation
in Russia.
* * *
President of Russia Vladimir Putin:
Good
afternoon, colleagues.
Today, we will discuss support measures
for several economic sectors in need of additional, targeted
support. We will hear from Mr Shuvalov and Mr Manturov.
But before we turn to the matters
on our agenda, I would like to ask Ms Skvortsova to begin
with the epidemiological situation in the country
as a whole and in Moscow in particular.
Healthcare Minister Veronika Skvortsova:
Colleagues,
Last summer we started preparing very thoroughly
for this year’s epidemic season. For the first time since
monitoring began, we vaccinated more than 45 million people – a third
of the country’s population, and the vaccinations used
contain the strains responsible for the current epidemic.
Studies conducted in November show that immunity
in the population was more than 61 percent for swine flu,
and more than 77–85 percent for all other strains of flu.
This means that overall, with the vaccinations,
people will either not catch the flu or, if they do catch it, their
symptoms will be milder and not so serious.
The flu that has taken us to epidemic level
arrived in Russia in the second week of January, and what
is somewhat unusual is that it came up through the southern regions –
Rostov and Volgograd regions and Stavropol Territory. Epidemics
usually arrive from the east, but this time, it has come from regions
in a poor epidemic situation in Eastern Europe, including
in Ukraine.
Epidemics have been declared in 47 regions
in all federal districts, except the Crimean Federal District.
On all counts, the epidemic is of mid-intensity at present.
The epidemic threshold has been exceeded by 31.5 percent on average
around the country.
As far as the spread of different
strains goes, H1N1 swine flu strains account for 75 to 95 percent,
with other strains considerably less apparent. The epidemic’s severity is
no worse than similar epidemics in past years. People who were not
vaccinated have the most serious symptoms, especially people
in the risk groups: children under the age of two, pregnant
women and adults with chronic illnesses or who are late to seek
medical assistance.
Let me note that the situation is fully under
control and the system is ready in terms of both monitoring
the flu situation and providing medical help.
(Ms Skvortsova went on to speak about
the availability of anti-viral medicines on the market,
infectious diseases hospitals’ preparedness levels, and flu prevention
measures among the public).
Overall, we have the situation under control. It
has not exceeded the limits of our usual situation in this
season, and we hope it will stay this way.
Vladimir Putin: Ms Skvortsova, there is some new bug
from Latin America on its way, some new virus. Mosquitos cannot fly across
the oceans of course, but infected people can and do. This virus
has already arrived in Europe. Can you say a couple of words
on this, please?
Veronika Skvortsova: This is the Zika virus. We
have been monitoring it from the moment it appeared. Now, we are working
on keeping new, unknown strains under control, including those that have
gained new characteristics through laboratory development, and making sure
we have Russian-made medicines for prevention and treatment. We have
a closed list of similar infectious agents and are working
on this issue now.
Vladimir Putin: I ask you to give this
matter your attention, because as far as I know, this illness
affects pregnant women and can have serious consequences
for children. We therefore need to give this our attention. You have
good experience here. This requires work with transport companies, airlines,
understanding the symptoms and responding rapidly. Of course, we
also need to work on the medicines.
Veronika Skvortsova: Yes, certainly. This is ongoing
work.
Vladimir Putin: Good. Thank you.
This year, Mr Trutnev headed Russia’s delegation
at the World Economic Forum in Davos. Could you say a few
words about your impressions?
Deputy Prime Minister and Presidential
Plenipotentiary Envoy to the Far Eastern Federal District Yury Trutnev:
Mr President,
In Davos, we concentrated above all
on organising work with big companies interested in investing
in the Russian Federation. We held talks with a number
of large companies from the Asia-Pacific region and Europe,
and mapped out our next steps. This work concerns primarily investment
in the Far East.
There was a session devoted to Russia
and we had a number of meetings with colleagues from European
governments. They mostly raised two questions.
The first was that their economies are also
suffering losses due to the sanctions imposed on Russia,
and they think efforts should be organised to get these sanctions
lifted as soon as possible.
As for the second question, we had
a number of meetings with government and company officials from
oil exporting countries, and they say too that they are not happy with
the world oil prices. They think that with prices at this level, it
is not possible to invest in oil exploration and developing new
fields, especially offshore fields. They therefore raised the issue
of coordinating action in this area in order to change
the price. If we do not do this, at some point
in the future, humanity will simply end up facing an energy
supply shortage.
Finally, there was a meeting of world
leaders, which also gave considerable attention to relations with Russia.
I spoke at that meeting too.
We heard some quite harsh criticism from [NATO
Secretary General Jens] Stoltenberg, and [President of Ukraine Petro]
Poroshenko spoke too. I simply described the picture as Russia’s
people – 90 percent of our 146 million people – see it,
and said that the situation is really quite the opposite.
Vladimir Putin: You should be more careful
in your words, all right?
I recently took part in the Small
Business – National Idea? forum organised by OPORA Russia. Mr
Shuvalov, I know a list of instructions has already been drafted
and the Government is preparing to implement them. Could you say
a few words on this?
Mr President, colleagues,
You took part in the national forum
organised by public organisation OPORA Russia on January 20.
The forum’s sessions looked at whether small business really is
a national idea for our country, and, if not, what measures
the federal government and the regional authorities should take.
You took part in the plenary session, answered questions
and listened to requests.
On January 26, you signed the list
of instructions sent out to the Government, Central Bank
and regional authorities. Mr President, regarding your earlier
instructions, particularly those concerning implementation
of the anti-crisis plan in 2015, the Government
and the legislators have completed practically all
of the work. The only matter still outstanding is to carry
out your instruction to define the status of self-employed
people so that they can register with the tax authorities
as self-employed and pay the relevant insurance and tax
payments.
Vladimir Putin: It is important to get this done.
Igor Shuvalov: We have completed all
of the other work planned, including establishing the new
federal corporation and transferring funds to it, taking
the Bank for Small and Medium Enterprises out from under
Vnesheconombank’s responsibility and putting it under the new
corporation’s operations management, and other steps. Among other things,
the plan we are drafting now will contain a substantial support
package for small and medium business in 2016.
(Mr Shuvalov went on to speak about needed
legislative amendments, work with complaints from the public about
businesspeople’s actions, preventing the use of various tax evasion
schemes, and the work of banks in which the state has
a stake).
Businesspeople addressed the following request
to you. They say that in the current difficulties,
the domestic market’s possibilities are not as big as we would
like, budget resources are limited, and small and medium businesses
are therefore opening up new export opportunities. They want the Russian
Export Centre to concentrate not only on big projects but also
to establish a support system for small and medium
businesses’ export contracts, and they want the Russian trade offices
abroad to reformat their work in accordance.
We held a meeting of the relevant
Vnesheconombank committee on this matter and listened
to the different points of view. There are various proposals
here, for example, to have the Russian Export Centre continue
to focus on larger contracts, while the Federal Corporation
for Supporting Small and Medium Business, acting under the Export
Centre’s methodological direction, will take care of smaller
contracts.
But we will nevertheless start by seeing if we
can base this network at the Russian Export Centre or build it
in partnership with this corporation. In any event, the work
will be done and we will provide all possible export support measures.
Vladimir Putin: The trade offices can work with
small and large businesses.
Economic Development Minister Alexei Ulyukayev: We are launching ten projects at our trade
offices in Asia and Europe, which will set up trading houses together
with the Russian Export Centre. The Russian Export Centre
and the trade offices will create a single platform, which can
be used to actively promote these services for small and medium
business.
Vladimir Putin: That is the right approach. Thank
you.
Ms Golodets, the Russian Popular Front held its
first regional forum on Monday, its first regional conference. Many issues
were raised at that event, but one of the most frequent was
the question of accessible education and its quality.
I know the Education and Science Ministry is currently working
on a project called Open School. Could you tell us about it?
Deputy Prime Minister Olga Golodets:
Mr President,
We see that demand for online education is
constantly on the rise in Russia today. We have two big projects
underway right now. One is about online education for people with
disabilities, and provides for kids who have disabilities
and need to study from home. We have 19,000 people using this system.
The system is in operation and the quality
of the teaching provided is improving all the time. This is one
of the priorities for our education system
in general.
The second system was launched on your
instruction in 2014. This is a big programme called Education
in Russian. The portal began work in 2014, with 78,000 people
as regular listeners. We now have 320,000 regular listeners in 174
countries. Demand for this portal’s services is growing very fast
and the portal has 2.5 million users now. We see the biggest
demand coming from countries where there is limited access
to the Russian language, education in Russian and Russian
culture. Demand is highest for classes that teach about Russian culture
and Russian and Soviet traditions, and that acquaint users with
Russian life. This portal will continue to develop.
These courses also show just what big demand there is
for an online school on the domestic and international
markets. In other words, there is demand for a full online
general school programme here in Russia and abroad.
This project will start work in December 2016.
Initially it will be an open educational resource. All subjects, from
the first year of school through to the final year
of school are being prepared and read now by Russia’s best
teachers. Teaching support materials include the best video material we
have, the benchmark works in Russian literature, culture
and art. This project will work as an auxiliary portal
at first and provide an important support resource
for Russian education, especially in remote regions. Starting
in 2018, it will work as an actual school, in other words,
it will be possible to enrol in this school, receive
an education, and obtain a school education certificate.
The project is designed to function
as a school for up to 1 million people, and we hope
to have it working at design capacity by 2020.
Vladimir Putin: Good. This is a good project.
Let’s turn to the main item on our
agenda now – support for specific economic sectors.
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