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- In due course: the Russian Federation will strengthen control over import substitution in the field of public procurement
In due course: the Russian Federation will strengthen control over import substitution in the field of public procurement
Russia intends to strengthen control over public procurement in terms of requirements for the use of domestic components and equipment. Vladimir Putin gave the corresponding instruction on May 26 at a meeting with representatives of the business community in the Kremlin. The business is concerned about cases when some customers find ways to replace Russian equipment with imported ones. Among the priority areas of economic development, the head of state outlined the creation of fully robotic industries, as well as the development of domestic software. At the same time, in the last two years, "in far from greenhouse conditions," the Russian economy has grown at a faster pace, he noted. Against this background, the return of foreign companies to the Russian market is possible only if the country benefits from it.
How fast is the Russian economy growing
On Russian Entrepreneurship Day, Vladimir Putin met with the heads of a number of companies in the Kremlin: 20 heads of enterprises gathered around the table, who today ensure the technological sovereignty of the country and successfully replace brands that have left Russia. In addition, the economic block of the government took part in the event — as a result, it dragged on for almost 2.5 hours.
Russian President Vladimir Putin during a meeting with representatives of the Russian business community
"The intense daily work of an entrepreneur paves the way to success, to the success of his business, his company. And eventually, without any exaggeration, to the success of the whole country. Russian Russians remember history and we know what a huge role the commercial, merchant, and entrepreneurial class played in the development of the Russian North, Siberia, the Far East, the Urals, Novorossiya, and the Black Sea region, in the creation of the Russian navy, railways, in supporting our culture, science, and education, and in carrying out the first Russian industrialization at the turn of the 19th century.It laid the foundations for the development of the country's industry and infrastructure for decades to come," Vladimir Putin said.
He also noted the contribution of business to the development of the Russian economy in the 21st century: it is actually the revival of agriculture, the construction industry, entire sectors of industry and modern services. This, he said, strengthens the country's industrial, technological and financial sovereignty.
"And without this sovereignty, no other sovereignty is possible, because everything is based on it, it is the foundation," Vladimir Putin stressed.
The Russian economy has reached the fourth place in the world in terms of purchasing power parity. In 2024, its growth reached 4.3% and covered a wide range of areas: industry, agriculture, digital technologies, services, finance.
— After the departure of foreign manufacturers in various sectors by 2024, the share of Russian manufacturers has changed, somewhere increased to 40%, and somewhere up to 72%. And this percentage is constantly growing. If in 2023 it was noted that this was 20-30%, in some industries up to 35-40%, now we see the figure of 70%. This indicates the rapid development and filling of various niches that became vacant after the departure of foreign enterprises and manufacturers," Natalia Poluyanova, a member of the State Duma Committee on Small and Medium—sized Enterprises, told Izvestia.
What the business asked the president to do
This is the second meeting of the head of state with business representatives in a month. On May 13, he spoke with members of the Business Russia NGO. At both events, the president emphasized that Western brands that left in 2022 should be able to return, but this should primarily be beneficial to the country's economy.
In a conversation with Oleg Paroev, CEO of the Deliciously—and-Point restaurant chain, Vladimir Putin noted that McDonald's simply "disappeared" three years ago, and in response to this, it is unlikely that the Russian Federation will "spread the path" if they want to return.
Oleg Paroev recalled that more than 60,000 people worked for the American corporation in Russia, and another 100,000 worked for local supply chain companies. All of them remained in limbo after McDonald's departure.
"Large companies operating in other sectors of the economy are already coming to me, saying that our partners are sending signals, they want to return. I say, please, let them come back. Well, just think about the conditions," said Vladimir Putin. — If it is beneficial for you, please come back. If something is unprofitable, let's make it profitable, that's all.… After all, I'm a lawyer by basic education, I know what it is. If you give me the contract, I'll look through it now and show you how and what needs to be done. We have good specialists. We will definitely help you."
In recent years, Russian business has faced acute challenges: disruption of previously familiar payment and international settlement mechanisms, changes in logistics, and cooperative chains. In addition, a number of foreign companies completely "framed" their Russian partners when leaving the market, the president recalled.
The entrepreneurs confirmed these statements, but nevertheless addressed the head of state with their concerns and requests. For example, they asked to establish more fair conditions for labeling an "Honest sign" and to help establish contacts with friendly states for cooperation.
A wide—ranging discussion arose at the request of metallurgists to provide holidays for the payment of the liquid steel excise tax introduced in 2022 for new metallurgical enterprises. We are talking about companies that produce steel using the advanced method of electrometallurgy. Vladimir Putin recalled that there are now certain preferences regarding the payment of income tax. Nevertheless, the head of state instructed the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Economic Development to study the situation with the excise tax on liquid steel for electrometallurgy enterprises.
Business is also concerned about the situation with public procurement: since the beginning of this year, changes in the rules of the national regime for public procurement have been implemented to protect Russian manufacturers, but some customers are still finding ways to replace domestic equipment with imported ones. In this regard, the business proposed to strengthen control over procurement procedures.
Vladimir Putin allowed the introduction of fines for violations of regulations in the field of procurement of domestic equipment. The Ministry of Economic Development supported this proposal so that there would be no attempts to replace Russian equipment with imported ones, said Maxim Reshetnikov, head of the Ministry of Economic Development. Nevertheless, no special measures are required to combat the substitution of imported Russian equipment and components, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said.
"If there are loopholes that allow bypassing the Russian national manufacturer, they must be closed. Even if it's a little more expensive. This state must pay at the first stage for the establishment of a national industry," Vladimir Putin said.
Separately, the president called for paying attention to the work of foreign marketplaces in Russia, since now it is a real "hole" through which you can import anything, including counterfeit products.
Prospects for the development of the cybersecurity industry in the Russian Federation
One of the participants in the meeting suggested "slightly" limiting the activities of companies that "have not fully left," including Zoom and Microsoft. The fact is that the so-called landing law is currently in force in Russia: according to it, foreign IT corporations with a daily audience of more than 500 thousand users are required to open a branch in the country. Apple, AliExpress fulfilled all the requirements, Google, TikTok, Zoom and Microsoft partially "landed". Some companies, such as Wikimedia, have not fulfilled any of the requirements.
"We need to strangle them. I completely agree. I speak without any hesitation, because they are trying to strangle us, we must reciprocate them. That's all," said Vladimir Putin.
Moreover, the president did not abandon the business remark that while large companies are switching to Yandex and VK services, ordinary users have "bad habits" of using foreign analogues. The President called for this to be changed as well.
The issue of using Russian software was also raised — the president called it a matter of national security, especially in the field of public administration. He noted that the shortage of domestic software in 2022 was recognized as a vulnerability for the Russian Federation. Now, the country intends to "increase the use of software within the country, and in all sectors of the economy, and even more so in the public administration sector." At the same time, Vladimir Putin called the scale of the cybersecurity industry in Russia today unique.
"We have a unique industry in our country. It's not unique in general, its scaling growth is unique — that's what's unique. And the fact that our school turned out to be good, and the presence of good specialists who stayed in the country, despite everything, work, based on the fact that they do not just work among their language and culture, they work in their homeland. This is an extremely important thing," the head of state stressed.
The development of robotics remains one of the key areas in Russia. Vladimir Putin said that the creation of fully robotic production facilities, including logistics, is among the priorities. He instructed to develop and support projects for the creation of robotic logistics facilities in the Rostov and Nizhny Novgorod regions, which were demonstrated at a meeting with representatives of business circles.
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