Alexey Ostrovskiy met with the business community of the region

Problems and prospects of business development of Smolensk region were the main topics of the meeting of Governor Alexey Ostrovskiy with the business community of the region. More than 50 representatives of the small, medium and large-size businesses, including foreign investors, as well as specialized non-profit organizations participated in the meeting.

In his welcoming address to the businessmen, Alexey Ostrovskiy said that such meeting is held in such a wide format for the first time. The head of the region also told about the changes in the executive authorities of Smolensk region. According to him, in December, a part of the Department of Economic Development will be turned into a special division – the Investment Activity Department, the main task of which will be ongoing support of all investment projects. The emergence of the new structure will not lead to an increase in the number of the officials but will allow to deal with the problems that business representatives face efficiently and quickly.

In his welcoming address, Alexey Ostrovskiy raised the questions of state support of the businessmen. At the present moment, the regional legislation provides such forms of state support as tax incentives, subsidies, support of the investment projects, methodical, informational and organizational support, and others. For large organizations, tax incentives have become the main form of state support which small and medium-size businesses can also benefit from.

However, in the near future it is planned to provide large investors with even greater state support. The businesses are going to receive a full compensation of corporate income tax in the form of subsidies.

Another innovation in the state support of the businessmen will be an increase from one year to three years of the duration of the period for which a state loan is issued for production and agriculture industries.

At the meeting with the businessmen of the region Alexey Ostrovskiy also spoke about the general socio-economic development of Smolensk region.

According to the Governor, now there is a complicated macroeconomic situation and economic slowdown in the Russian economy in general and in Smolensk region in particular. According to the Ministry of Economic Development of Russia, in 2014, GDP growth rate is estimated at 0.5%, the growth rate of GRP in Smolensk region is estimated at 1.9%, which will be achieved due to the positive dynamics in a number of the production activities. In general, the industrial production index in the region has amounted to about 101.7 percent.

After the Governor’s speech, there was a discussion, during which the participants considered the issues raised by the representatives of the business community.

Thus, the Director General of the LLC TSK "Termogrupp" asked about the relationship between the business and legislative authorities of the region, in particular about the extent of businessmen’s participation in legislative activity. In response, Alexey Ostrovskiy urged the business community to participate more actively in this kind of activity. According to him, businessmen can be more active in the regulatory impact assessment procedure of the regional regulatory legal documents, which are to be and have already been adopted. An important element of this procedure is holding public consultations with stakeholders in business and investment activities, which allows to identify the position of the interested parties, to ensure the opportunity of taking their interests into consideration.

The representative of the German company raised the question of the participation of a legal entity, the sole founder of which is a foreign organization, in the state procurement. "There are no restrictions on this or that company participating in the tenders which are held on state procurement. In our region we try to implement Federal Law 44 solely on the principles which it was taken on: maximum openness, transparency, absence of corruption schemes", - said the Governor.

Besides, the representatives of the large companies of the region asked about the plans of the regional Administration to create specialized organizations dealing with attraction and support of investment projects. Answering this question, Alexey Ostrovskiy said that in the spring of the current year the Regional Development Corporation was created. The main purpose of this organization is to create investment sites in the region through the purchase of the unclaimed land shares. At the present moment, there is a decision to confer the Corporation with additional functions to attract and support the investment projects in the region, as well as to provide the production sites with the engineering and transport infrastructure. In the nearest future the specialists of the Administration are going to the "advanced" regions of the country in order to study the experience of the successful regional Corporations, and at the end of the year a similar organization will start its work in full force and in all directions.

At the end of the first part of the meeting with the business community, which was dedicated to the discussion of the large companies’ development, the President of the Smolensk Chamber of Commerce and Industry Vladimir Arhipenkov made a suggestion to increase the regional funding of the Euro Info Correspondence Centre (EICC). EICC was established in the region in the past year to provide the businessmen of Smolensk region with free information and consulting support and assistance in establishing and developing business cooperation with companies in other subjects of the Russian Federation and foreign companies. The organization provides assistance to the Smolensk businesses in looking for business partners in Russia and facilitating their entering foreign markets.

"Taking into consideration that this tool works really effectively, the funds will be allocated," - promised Alexey Ostrovskiy.

The second part of the meeting was dedicated to the problems and prospects of the development of small and medium-size businesses in Smolensk region. The Governor pointed out that in 2013 over 36.5 thousand of small and medium-sized companies were registered in Smolensk region. Compared with 2012 their number decreased by 11 percent. The main reason for such a decrease in the number of individual entrepreneurs is the factual changes at the federal level: increase of the insurance payments (the size of a fixed payment to the pension fund grew in more than two times), greater legal restrictions in the sphere of regulation of the alcoholic beverages retail and location of stationary objects.

In 2014, the negative trend of the decrease in the number of businesses operating in the region has stopped: the number of registered businesses and closed ones was almost equal.

The current structure of small and medium-size companies testifies to its primary development in the sector of wholesale and retail.

According to the Head of the region, the situation shows that it is necessary to strengthen the state policies in order to provide a comprehensive and targeted support to the agriculture, production, construction and transport companies. Alexey Ostrovskiy spoke about implementing in Smolensk region The Standard of the Executive Authorities of the Subject of the Russian Federation on ensuring a favorable investment climate in the region. This set of measures is aimed at improving the investment attractiveness of Smolensk region, investors’ rights protection, increasing transparency of the business support system, reducing administrative barriers. In addition, as part of the standard implementation the mechanisms for training and retraining of personnel are being developed, considering the needs of investors in personnel and in accordance with their requirements. According to the results of the survey, in which the representatives of more than a thousand of Smolensk companies took part, the regional forecast of the need in personnel until 2018 was prepared to meet the needs of the economy. Some important agencies, aimed at promoting the training and retraining of specialists of different professions, employment of graduates of vocational educational institutions have been set up in Smolensk region. As noted by Alexey Ostrovskiy, the partnership of state and business as one of the main directions of state policy in the field of vocational education is aimed at solving the problem of training qualified personnel in accordance with the needs of the regional workforce market. Currently, 257 of the social partners, representing trade unions in the region, are cooperating with the educational institutions.

Since 2013, the work on the creation and development of the infrastructure to support small and medium-size businesses has been carried out in Smolensk region. The total amount of funds allocated to support the business community in 2013 amounted to 251 million rubles, 200 million rubles of which were received from the federal budget. As part of the support measures, 113 small and medium-size businesses in the region were supported.

The results of 2013 showed that the chosen vector of business support was the right one, as it was in demand with the businessmen. Therefore, in the current year almost all directions of the work have been the same. The total of 285 million rubles, which is almost 35 million rubles more than in 2013, will be allocated for the state support of small and medium-size businesses in 2014. In 2014 it is planned to provide support in the form of subsidies to more than 150 businesses and organizations, which will allow to create more than 300 new jobs in the real sector of the economy. Besides, the established organizations of the business support infrastructure will help 184 small and medium-size businesses.

After that Alexey Ostrovskiy answered the questions asked by the businessmen. One of the questions concerned the problem of the personnel shortage in the companies, the main reason of which is the reluctance of young people to go to work at the factories. In this regard, the meeting suggested increasing awareness of high school students of working professions through guided tours of the companies, and, if possible, providing training in working professions in specially established production classes on the basis of secondary schools. The task of looking into the ways to do it was given by the Head of the region to the Education, Science and Youth Affairs Department of Smolensk region.

At the meeting, the Governor said that in 2015-2016 co-financing of municipalities will be continued in order to draw up the rules of use and development of land, as well the general plans of the settlements.

Moreover, the meeting discussed the issues of tax incentives for business start-ups, the problems of connecting companies to the energy facilities and of the tariff regulation, development of eco-tourism in Smolensk region, and a number of other topics.