Sergey Shishkarev appointed Business Council Chairman of the State Commission on Arctic development

On April 14, Moscow hosted the first meeting of the State Commission on Arctic development under the chairmanship of Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin.

The participants assessed the scope of work for the coming year, discussed the development of long-term business strategy, formed management bodies of the Commission and agreed to develop proposals for legal regulations.

The State Commission will consist of eight work groups, whose activities will be aimed at:

• ensuring national security (headed by Dmitry Rogozin himself),
• socio-economic development (headed by the Minister of economy of the Russian Federation Alexei Ulyukayev),
• development of transport infrastructure (transport Minister Maxim Sokolov),
• international cooperation (Deputy Minister of foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation Vladimir Titov),
• energy industry development (energy Minister Alexander Novak),
• industrial and technological development (Minister of industry of Russia Denis Manturov),
• promoting of environmental security and regional use of natural resources (the Minister of ecology and natural resources of the Russian Federation Sergey Donskoy),
• development of education and science (the Minister of education Dmitry Livanov).

In addition, the State Commission created two Advisory bodies, the Business Council (headed by the first Deputy Chairman of the Government Marine Board , the President of the Group of companies “Delo” – Sergey Shishkarev) and the Scientific expert Council under the authority of the special representative of Russian President on international cooperation in the Arctic and Antarctic Arthur Chilingarov.

The state Commission will meet in full at least once every six months to address key issues and for discussion of interim results. Once a quarter it is planned to hold a visiting sessions of the Presidium to different Arctic regions. The first one is scheduled for June 2015.

First meeting of the Commission, in addition to organizational issues, discussed and a number of pressing issues, such as financing of Arctic projects, development of the Northern sea route. According to D. Rogozin, “total funding of “sectoral” programs in 2015 – 2020 should be about 222 billion rubles, including funds from the Federal budget – about 160 billion rubles”. The range of projects is far from covering all the areas, the problems of sustainable development of the macro region and national security of Russia in the Arctic are solved “fragmentary and, in fact, haphazard,” concluded Mr. Rogozin.

In order to fulfill the presidential decree as of February 3, 2015, the Government of the Russian Federation on 14 March adopted the regulation on the State Commission on Arctic development. It was headed by Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Government Dmitry Rogozin.

The Commission is composed of 80 people, among them – the heads of Federal ministries and agencies; senior officials of subarctic regions of Russia; presidential envoys in Volga region, the Northwest, Ural, Siberia and the Far Easter; top executives of mining companies, representatives of scientific and public organizations.