President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Good afternoon. It is a great pleasure to see you all.
It is my practice, and that of my colleagues, when we visit a region, we try to look at how the local work is going, what the business climate is like, and what is being done to address social sector issues.
I would like to discuss with you the state of progress in our plans to develop this vast Far East region. As you know, we have many different plans that have been incorporated into different programmes.
I would like to hear first-hand from you about the situation, what you are doing, how you are going about it, and what problems you encounter.
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Vladimir Putin: We have been looking at just this one region, and the Far East is much vaster, of course. Here, we have high technology, aircraft manufacturing, shipbuilding, and also the space sector that we will be studying more closely later.
These are complex sectors, and we still have a lot to do to ensure that everything works like clockwork. This applies to processing in the agricultural sector, construction materials, infrastructure, and oil refineries. In short, we need this kind of real diversification, which is very good from the point of view of the region’s interests.
You said that you are building a plant and that you are already buying up most of what this new cement plant will produce. The soya processing plant is already signing contracts for soya supplies. In other words, it is providing jobs and activity for the farmers. The same goes for small and medium-sized businesses working in vital sectors and producing the goods that our people need on a daily basis.
This is all very good and shows that at the Government and regional levels the preliminary work has been carried out properly. Now we just need to make sure that we keep problems to a minimum in the actual practical implementation, and if they do arise, we must react swiftly and take the right response measures.
Thank you to you all.