The Russian Research Centre in Svalbard is intended as a consortium of research, educational and other types of organisations. The centre will oversee exploration of the archipelago and the Arctic Ocean.
The concept for the Russian Research Centre in Svalbard was drafted by the Ministry of Education and Science pursuant to a decision of the Government Commission on Russia’s Presence on the Svalbard (Spitsbergen) Archipelago.
Research has been conducted regularly on the archipelago since the 1960s involving a dozen of Russian research organisations of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, the Federal Service for Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring and the Federal Agency for Scientific Organisations. Research is being carried out in the fields of geophysics, glaciology, oceanography, biology, geology, archaeology and history. Pollution and hydrometeorological monitoring are also carried out.
The Russian Research Centre (hereafter referred to as the Centre) will be established in Svalbard to coordinate research efforts and improve the funding mechanism for research on the archipelago. The Centre will act as a consortium of research, educational and other types of organisations.
The Centre will not be a legal entity, and will be managed by oversight and research councils.
Members of the scientific consortium will be independent legal and economic entities with shared research infrastructure.
The Centre will be coordinated by the Federal Service for Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring’s Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute. The latter will establish a permanent Russian Arctic research expedition in Svalbard to provide logistical support to winter and seasonal expeditions on the archipelago.
