“The new draft of Russia's energy strategy was approved in November of last year. Later on we revised the plan for the construction of electricity generating facilities and approved the draft plan for the general development of the gas industry, as well as the national energy conservation programme. The common goal of all of these documents is to create the necessary conditions for the most effective possible use of the country's energy resources.”
“Also, macroeconomic stability, low inflation, affordable credit, a reasonable budget deficit at certain stages and a good balance between debts and reserves all play a tremendous role in creating a friendly investment climate. I believe it may even possible to increase these reserves to some extent, considering the current rise in petroleum prices. To sum up, we should take a comprehensive view of the situation. Such an approach helps us to avoid diffusing funds too much or making promises we cannot fulfil. We have another objective: we should structure our efforts so as to fund priority projects and at the same time preserve a sustainable macroeconomic environment, thus guaranteeing the macroeconomic stability of the budget and the entire national economy.”
“Turn to federal targeted programmes proper. They account for a sizeable portion of the national budget. In particular, 740 billion roubles have been earmarked this year to develop advanced technology, build up social and transport infrastructure, solve housing problems and enhance security. The federal targeted programmes for 2011 will certainly address these obvious priorities.”
“I would like to remind you that a related law was passed late last year, followed by a comprehensive government action plan. We are facing an ambitious challenge to reduce the energy intensity of the Russian GDP by at least 40% by 2020. The need for a transition to a proactive energy conservation policy is obvious to everybody. First of all, it allows for economising. The public, the state budget and Russian companies can pay less for heat and electricity without compromising service quality.Most importantly, the energy conservation policy results in a substantial quality upgrade, improves the structure of the economy, urges companies to upgrade production facilities, creates a big market for high-tech commodities and services as well as thousands of high-skilled and high-paid jobs.”
“We should pay increasing attention to the projects outlined in the Main Guidelines for Government Performance in the mid-term and long-term perspective. First and foremost, we should focus on the projects designed to overcome technological backwardness and increase labour productivity, as well as on efforts to resolve urgent healthcare and educational issues.”
"The government should encourage all useful and socially responsible activities, including through tax breaks. I would like to recall in relation to this, that a number of draft laws on additional charity incentives have already been submitted to the State Duma. We hope that the Duma deputies will review them promptly, and lend them their support."
"I hope that the new programme for drafting technical regulations prepared by the Ministry of Industry and Trade will contain an exhaustive list of the documents, which we must adopt in 2010 and 2011 if we are to, finally, draw a line under this. The real economy should be given an opportunity to produce goods under modern standards and rules, which should encourage its development, not be a burden to it."
"Our primary goal is to diversify our economy, and to break from mono-economy. In the first place, we will encourage companies, both Russian and foreign, dealing in our priority sectors."
"Of course, efforts to replace imports are not an end in itself, as I have said more than once. We will succeed only if we replace imports with goods that are completely safe, of a high quality and, importantly, sold at affordable prices. Both producers of agricultural goods and consumers - the Russian people - should benefit from this".
"A schedule for introducing electronic options of key state services has also been approved. According to this schedule, this year, Russians will be given an opportunity of filing applications for dozens of important state services online. It means they will no longer have to go to offices and wait in queues".