Opening the working group meeting, Igor Levitin stressed that performance on the President’s instructions issued following the State Council meeting of April 7, 2015, on support of small and medium-sized businesses significantly improved the investment climate in the regions.
At the same time, this year’s national ranking shows that, despite an improvement in certain regions, the overall investment climate in the country has hardly changed. The aggregated index for the country has only increased by 0.8 points and the three leaders remain to be the Republic of Tatarstan, Belgorod and Kaluga regions. Consistent efforts by regional authorities are required to maintain and improve the investment climate.
The working group developed targeted regulatory models on key topics of the State Council report, including construction permits, real estate title registration, cadastral registration, connecting to utilities networks, lifting administrative barriers for businesses and support for small businesses.
The working group also discussed the development of guidelines (roadmaps) based on the regions’ best practices; improvement of the quality of regional legislation regarding the protection of investors and support of investment activity; increasing the efficiency of specialised organisations in attracting investment and investor relations.
Following a discussion, the working group approved the draft report of the State Council Presidium developed by the Tyumen Region Government and the Strategic Initiatives Agency with an extensive involvement of expert and research communities.