Prospects for the development of key industries were discussed in Tatarstan

Problems and prospects of development of key industries of Tatarstan discussed today at a round table in the House of the Government of the Republic of Tajikistan within the framework of the visiting session of the Committee of the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation on economic policy, industry, innovation and entrepreneurship. The event was attended by the President of the Republic of Tatarstan - Rustam Minnikhanov, Deputy Prime Minister of RT - Minister of Industry and Trade of the RT -Albert Karimov, Chairman of the State Duma Committee on economic policy, industry, innovation and entrepreneurship - Sergey Zhigarev, deputies of the State Duma of the Russian Federation. From the RT Ministry of Economy the first Deputy Minister - Director  the Department of Enterprise Development - Rustem Sibgatullin took part in the event.

While welcoming the participants, Rustam Minnikhanov thanked them for choosing Tatarstan as a place for the offsite meeting and the opportunity to discuss the issues of development of key national industries. 

He noted that Tatarstan was one of the leading industrial regions of Russia. Today the republic takes the 5th place in the country by volume of shipped products with  the  similar position  by volume of GRP. In addition, Tatarstan is the third region in Russia in terms of investments in fixed assets and by the volume of agricultural production. The priorities for further development are identified in the Strategy-2030: these are the industries of petrochemistry, agriculture and automotive industry. 

“Tatarstan - is the oil repubic. We produce 35 million tons of oil. Today an active work is being done in respect of difficult oil resources, said  the President of the RT. - The enterprises of Tatarstan recycle 17 million tons of oil. At the end of the year, we will complete the work on the new refinery plant with capacity of 6 million tons. In total we will recycle about 23 million tons. 

He also informed, that at the end of last year on the complex TANECO a delayed coking unit was launched. It allows to bring the depth of oil processing to the maximum possible extent of 99.2%. TAIF-NK is also finalizing the construction of Complex for deep processing of heavy residues with a depth of processing up to 98.5%.

Out of the new large projects Rustam Minnikhanov specified the opening of the complex “Ammonium” for production of ammonia, methanol and urea, as well as the construction of a new ethylene complex on the enterprise “Nizhnekamskneftekhim”, which will be able to produce up to 1.2 million tons of ethylene a year.

Agriculture is another core industry of the republic, according to Rustam Minnikhanov. Tatarstan occupies the first place in the country by volume of milk production, the second  - for collecting potatoes, the  fourth - for meat production. Over the past eight  years 155 billion rubles were invested into this industry. Small forms of management - personal subsidiary farms and peasant farming are being actively supported. The programme of constructing mini-farms and family farms are being implemented. 

“Sales market is very important for the agro-industrial complex. Unfortunately, the farmers receive  miserable revenue from sales of their products. Part of the money goes to processors, part - to trading networks. That is why we have built a large agricultural production park in the city of Kazan. In total it is planned to create 6 agricultural production parks in the Republic to enable manufacturers to sell their products directly, bypassing the middlemen”, said the President of the RT.  

He added that today on the territory of the Republic of Tatarstan the programmes for revamping agroindustrial complex and upgrading the material base  (overhaul of barns, machine-and-tractor parks, vegetable stores) were implemented. 

Significant changes have occurred in the structure of the Republic's industry. From 2010 the share of processing sector increased from 62.8% to 70.9%, alongside  with a decline of the share of commodity segment from 28.7% to 22.5%, informed the President of the RT the participants of the meeting.  

Turning to the topic of car building, Rustam Minnikhanov outlined the two leading companies in this industry - KAMAZ and Ford Sollers. According to his words both of them did a great job in part of the development of automotive components' production: “We have a full range of components that correspond to the world standards. Component base, localization of production - is a very important element.” 

The RT President added that a serious attention in the republic is paid to creating technology and industrial parks, various industrial sites. The municipal entities are envolved into this practice.

“The implementation of all these projects is impossible without appropriate assistance to federal authorities. In our work we always feel the support of the deputies of the State Duma. We are open to dialogue and collaboration on all fronts,” - he concluded.

Further presentations were made by the Russian Duma deputies -  Irek Boguslavsky (“Prospects for economic development of the agro-industrial complex with the reorientation from the export to a deep processing inside the country”) and Alfia Kogogina (“Development of the industry and enhancing its competitiveness”).