Russian Industrial Growth: Development Projects In Hand
New aircraft and other projects being rolled out as industrial production increased 12.8% in May
The Ilyushin Il-96-400M wide-body passenger aircraft is set to be trialled for service from this Autumn
The Russian Prime Minister, Mikhail Mishustin, has stated that Industrial production in Russia is increasing, even despite the sanctions, and this growth has accelerated. He made the remarks at the Innoprom International Industrial Exhibition last week, in Yekaterinburg. The annual event is Russia’s largest industrial expo.
Mishustin said that “Our country is consistently coping with challenges. Over the past four years, industrial production has increased by 7%. This year the positive dynamics accelerated. This is also in the context of a break in supply chains and unprecedented sanctions pressure. President Putin set the task to ensure an increase in the volume of this sector, including its share in the gross domestic product. We will progressively increase it.” According to him, industrial production in the manufacturing sector increased by 12.8% in May.
Mishustin noted that the machine-building complex remains the main driver in this case. The output of such products in May increased by almost 1.5 times compared to the same period in 2022.
Innoprom is considered the main industrial, trade and export platform in Russia. This exhibition has been held in the capital of the Urals since 2010. In 2023, the theme of the exhibition is “Sustainable Production: Renewal Strategies”. The main areas of the agenda for four days will be metalworking, digital manufacturing, transport engineering, energy technologies, new materials, industrial IT, medical equipment, technologies for cities and the production of components.
Delegations from 35 countries took part in the exhibition, while over a thousand companies are represented. Russian participation included stands from 25 different regions across the country.
The partner country of this years’ exhibition was Belarus (last year it was Kazakhstan). The VII Russian-Chinese Expo also took place at the Innoprom site, where 500 Chinese companies presented their products. Russia also made calls to cooperate with Chinese companies in the microelectronics sector.
Concerning Belarussia’s Chairing of the Innoprom event, Minsk and Moscow have already approved 16 industrial cooperation projects worth ₽80 billion (US$880 million) and began to fulfil most of them, said Mishustin. He noted that joint work with Belarus plays a significant role in achieving Russia’s technological sovereignty.
Mishustin also said that Russia is ready to further develop economic cooperation with other countries, including in the field of technology.
Meanwhile, Denis Manturov, Russia’s Minister of Industry and Trade has stated that Russia’s Industrial Development Fund (IDF) in 2023 can be recapitalized in the amount of up to ₽25 billion (US$280 million) due to contributions to the budget from the sale of foreign assets in Russia.
He called the IDF a comprehensive investment platform: in 2022, a record amount of loans was provided from the FRP to ₽140 billion (US$1.55 billion). In 2023, there will be up to ₽100 billion (US$1.2 billion) available.
Mishustin recalled that a little over a month ago, Russia approved the concept of the national technological development, which will give a powerful impetus to the development of key areas such as machine tool building, radio electronics, light-tonnage chemistry, shipbuilding and aircraft building. He also noted the creation of high-capacity gas turbines, diesel and piston engines, unmanned aerial vehicles, medical products, and medicines, stating that “In total, at least ten such megaprojects will be deployed. With guaranteed funding for the entire implementation period.”
After the concept is adopted, critical and end-to-end technologies become the object of technological policy, and the range of industries in industries that should meet the priority needs for import substitution includes up to 400 items. Mishustin reiterated his confidence that the future belongs to the production of the entire range of its own high-tech products. “Moreover, it must be competitive not only within the country, but also abroad, which requires fundamentally new approaches and a completely different level of interaction between science, industry and the state,” he said.
Government officials have debated whether Russia’s industrial sector is more competitive due to low gas prices. Gas prices in Russia are regulated by the state both for industry and for the population, said Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak. According to him, in terms of foreign currency, they amount to approximately US$70-75 per 1,000 cubic metres of gas, while on world markets to US$500. “Our industrial consumers have lower costs, and respectively, are more competitive in world markets for the sale of their products.” Novak said.
Mishustin drew attention that in 2023 the first domestic high-power serial gas turbine will be delivered to the Nizhnekamsk CHPP, and in 2025, lithium-ion batteries will roll off the assembly line from the country’s first gigafactory for the production of energy storage devices. On Monday, Mishustin took part in the opening of a factory producing diesel engines in Tatarstan.
He also said that Russia is additionally implementing large-scale plans to upgrade the merchant shipping fleet; by 2035 Russian shipyards will have launched about a thousand vessels. However, he named civil unmanned aerial systems, including drone, the production of which still needs to be developed, as the growth driver for many sectors of the economy and various service industries.
He also said that Russia’s wide-body giant liner, the Il-96-400M is being prepared for entry into service. The aircraft design contains no foreign materials and products. Comprehensive tests of the Superjet with domestic PD-8 engines will begin in Autumn this year.
However, Ivan Andrievsky, a Vice president of the Russian Union of Engineers has said that “The refusal to rely on imported technologies is a strategy, but not a reality, as in coming years Russia will be forced to use them.” This means that looking ahead, while Russia is quite capable of working with its own technologies, it will remain impossible to cancel the international scientific and technical exchange that has existed with foreign counterparts. Russia has chosen the most difficult path, it will develop in all technological areas.
Andrievsky said that “A secondary option, which many countries are following, is specialisation in some limited range of areas. While Western technologies are closed to Russia, friendly countries including China, India and Brazil, have developed in a number of industrial and aviation directions. Russia now needs to revive its machine tool industry, as it is the basis of all technologies. We need to create techno cities following the example of how science is developed in science cities, for example, in Novosibirsk.”
Source: Nezavisimaya Gazeta