Agenda: Implementing the federal budget in the first quarter of 2021, draft federal laws and budgetary funding.
Mikhail Mishustin’s opening remarks:
Good afternoon, colleagues,
Today, we will start our meeting by discussing support for families with children. As per the President’s instructions, the Government reimburses parents for half of the cost of vouchers for their children’s trip to a summer camp. Following a hard year for children, this is an excellent opportunity for them to improve their health, to enjoy many experiences and to find new friends.
In May, we already spent five billion roubles on this. Today, we will allocate an additional 4.5 billion. This will make it possible to reimburse parents who bought vouchers for their children before the children’s leisure cashback programme was officially launched. Over 220,000 children will be able to relax this summer, with the state’s support, on favourable terms, to gain strength and have a good time.
As per the President’s instructions, the Government is also continuing to support families receiving their third child or more. They get 450,000 roubles each, and they can use the money for repaying their mortgages. People are actively using this option. It is therefore necessary to supplement the amount that was originally provided for in the federal budget. We are supplying more than 27 billion roubles today. This will make it possible to provide housing for at least 60,000 families with many children.
People with disabilities require special attention, too. Today, we will review amendments that will allow people with impaired eyesight to access additional works of fiction, academic and periodical publications. For this purpose, it is necessary to lift certain restrictions in copyright law, so that it will be possible to print special-format books and materials for these readers without the prior consent of the authors and without paying the relevant royalties to them. At the same time, it will, of course, be impossible to do this under commercial profit-oriented plans. This literature will be delivered to libraries and special organisations, and people with impaired eyesight will be able to use it free of charge and without any restrictions. This will allow them to obtain more information in a readily accessible format.
And now, a few words about the Government meeting’s economic agenda. We will review the federal budget’s implementation in the first quarter of 2021. The Government has implemented an unprecedented package of support measures. This has had a positive impact on economic development, and this in turn has expanded consumer demand and employment.
Business activity is resuming, including in those sectors that had ground to a halt. The number of unemployed persons, registered by the relevant service, has plunged almost two-fold since December 2020. Housing construction rates have accelerated, including through large-scale mortgage support.
Enterprises have resumed their investment programmes. The relatively low interest rates that served as an effective incentive for this process are now about 30 percent lower than two years ago.
All this also affected the budget, with revenues considerably exceeding specific forecasts. Budget revenues reached almost 5.3 trillion roubles. Incidentally, the share of oil and gas revenues has dwindled to 30.5 percent, and this means that Russia is becoming increasingly less dependent on raw materials.
Despite the pandemic, a substantial budget surplus was posted. At the same time, public debt volumes remain at safe and comfortable levels.
We have picked up momentum. It is necessary to consolidate positive trends while unconditionally financing the state’s social and other high-priority obligations.
Here is another issue. The Government is adjusting legislation to simplify the export procedure for Russian livestock companies.
The demand for foods from Russia is growing. The demand for meat and dairy imports from Russia increased by over one-third last year. The geography of our export deliveries is expanding as well. Last year, Rosselkhoznadzor coordinated 40 veterinary certificates with 25 countries. Foreign countries gladly buy our dairy products and semi-finished goods, pork, poultry meat and many other products.
To be able to export their products, Russian agricultural businesses must have a certificate of compliance with the requirements of importing countries. To accelerate the procedure, we are amending our veterinary laws. The document sets out a procedure for the inspection of land, buildings and other facilities.
Rosselkhoznadzor will not charge for its inspections of compliance with the importing countries’ veterinary requirements if the owner files a requisite application. The results of these inspections will be added to the Federal State Information System for electronic processing of veterinary documents. Information about the facilities that do not comply with the requirements will be available on the system’s website as well.
I have no doubt that the adoption of this law will simplify the development of solid ties with our partners and emergence on new markets for honest companies.
Our agenda also includes a package of issues on environmental protection.
The current priority is the fight against forest fires. The situation in several regions is complicated. We will allocate over 2.5 billion roubles to help them put out fires as soon as possible. The bulk of these funds will be spent directly on firefighting in 25 regions of Russia. Other funds will be spent on additional forest fire monitoring measures in approximately 50 regions. We have organised monitoring on the ground and in the air with the help of aircraft, so that we not just fight fires but do our best to stop them from spreading.
Two other hot-button issues concern everyone and have to do with reducing environmental pollution. First of all, we must clear away unauthorised urban dumps. To do this more effectively, we will redistribute funds stipulated for this purpose under the Environment national project. Thanks to this, five more regions, specifically, the republics of Mordovia and Udmurtia and the Voronezh, Kaliningrad and Kirov regions, will receive nearly 900 million roubles within three years for clearing away dumps. Allocations for the reclamation of seven landfills in the Moscow Region will be increased by over 1.3 billion roubles as soon as this year.
The quality of life also depends on the air we breathe. We discussed this subject during my trip to Kuzbass. Air pollution is a major environmental problem for the residents of large industrial centres. We will additionally distribute 4.8 billion roubles for events held within the framework of the Clean Air federal project this year. Funds will be provided to four industrial regions with the largest number of industrial facilities, specifically, the Trans-Baikal Territory and the Vologda, Kemerovo and Chelyabinsk regions.
The Government will also continue to support the development of transport infrastructure throughout the country. We will additionally allocate approximately 7 billion roubles to complete or accelerate the construction of bridge crossings and motorway sections and to improve regional roads. This is what the people who live there and, of course, businesses need. We must get rid of bottlenecks and enhance road safety. The funds will be allocated to six regions. Nearly all the related facilities are in the final stages of completion. We hope that these transfers will help us to accelerate the completion of these construction projects.
