Agenda: Rules for awarding Presidential scholarships to post-graduate students, expanding support for parents of disabled children, improving the public procurement mechanism, supporting the new regions.
Government meeting
Mikhail Mishustin’s opening remarks:
Good afternoon, colleagues.
Today we are celebrating Science Day and the 300th anniversary of the Russian Academy of Sciences and St Petersburg State University.
I would like to sincerely congratulate our scientists, engineers, researchers, laboratory staff, graduate students, and everyone who works in this nationally important field.
Today, the level of technological development directly determines the competitiveness of our companies, industries, and the economy as a whole, as well as, of course, the well-being and quality of the lives of our people.
In the coming years, we will have to intensively increase the development of our own critical solutions in industry, in the IT sector, agriculture, medicine, and many other key areas, including as part of the implementation of megaprojects, in order to quickly achieve technological sovereignty, which is one of the goals that the President set for us.
We have a solid foundation for this: strong schools that continue the best traditions and augment the knowledge of domestic scientists, as well as talented youth.
There are 15 scientific and education centres today. We are updating the equipment base. Megascience-class installations are under constructions. Last week we, together with the president, opened several new sites at world-level campuses.
We will continue to create an environment for breakthrough solutions in Russia’s regions using the latest achievements of our science.
We are grateful to our scientists for fundamental and applied research and for creative work that is very important for the whole country. They are the ones who lay the foundation for further progress.
The government continues to create favourable conditions for Russian researchers.
For example, at a recent meeting between the head of state and young scientists in Sochi, increasing Presidential scholarships for post-graduate students conducting research in a technological field was discussed.
A Government resolution was signed specifying the rules for distributing scholarships and the monthly amount, which will be 75,000 roubles. Depending on the length of full-time study, they will be designated for a period of one to four years. The scholarship candidate is nominated by the scientific supervisor, and the winners will be determined based on the results of a competitive selection.
We hope that this measure will make it possible to support talented young scientists at the beginning of their career track and help them show their talents and professional achievements, so that more cutting-edge innovations find practical application in industry, science, medicine, electronics and other essential sectors.
To another topic.
Last December, the President signed an executive order to expand support for families with children with disabilities. Amendments to the current law have been prepared.
Staring 1 January 2024, working parents and guardians are provided with social benefits for caring for a disabled child under 18 years of age, as well as group I disabled people since childhood, if they have part-time employment, including remote work or work at home. The amount of this assistance is 10,000 roubles a month.
Previously, it was only available to mothers and fathers who were not employed. Now it is available if a person gets part-time work. They will be provided with both benefits and their salary.
Citizens will have more opportunities to combine care for their loved ones with professional activities. And at the same time maintain state support.
Let’s get to the agenda.
Today we will discuss the improvement of the state procurement mechanism. The rules for holding state procurement and selecting a tender winner must become as simple and transparent for all the parties as possible, and be based on the unconditional priority of Russian brands.
This approach is extremely important for the development of industry and allows us to encourage the creation of new domestic production facilities, including in radio electronics, metallurgy, railway and agricultural engineering, the automobile industry, the machine tool industry, textiles, furniture, pharmaceutical industries and many other spheres that are significant for the Russian economy and for the lives of people.
In line with the President’s instructions, the Government has prepared amendments to legislation to optimise procurement procedures. They establish a uniform procedure for providing advantages for domestic products.
First of all, we are talking about the legal grounds both for the complete ban on participation in tenders of certain foreign goods or services, and for introducing restrictions under the “second odd one out” condition when there is a Russian bidder.
Another protective measure is the application of a conditional coefficient, which improves our companies’ price offer by 15 percent. If there is competition between several products that are manufactured domestically, preference will be given to the bidder with a higher technological level of domestic production. We will also make decisions on additional support for the Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics and the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions.
As the President noted, we need to bring these regions up to the national indicators.
The Government will allocate money to ensure that their budgets are balanced, which is important to improve the quality of life there. We will allocate 5 billion roubles to improve matters in housing and utilities, including the provision with water and heat, and implement other necessary measures in this sector. Providing these services and timely upgrades to infrastructure is an important part of our agenda.
We will also support agricultural producers in these republics and regions to increase the production of milk, potatoes and vegetables and to carry out agrotechnological work to obtain stronger grain harvests. Support will also be provided for companies in the baking industry. We have been using all these tools to an extent. Last year, more than a thousand agricultural enterprises in the new regions took advantage of these opportunities, and these tools have proven effective. We hope that such measures will allow us to increase the volume of agricultural products and, of course, improve their quality.
The government will continue to provide the necessary assistance to these regions, including restoring destroyed infrastructure, creating jobs and ensuring normal living conditions for citizens of Russia.
