Projects can be different. Yamal is ready to export snow and to deliver skiers

Large projects being fulfilled in the Arctic will grow over the years. It was said on the 10^th of December by the ambassador-at-large for international cooperation in the Arctic at the Ministry of foreign affairs of the Russian Federation Vladimir Barbin within the panel session on socioeconomic development of the Arctic in Salekhard.

In 2016 the Ministry of economic development of the Russian Federation prepared the list of projects for the Arctic. Their total cost makes more than 4 trillion 500 milliard rubles or more than 70 milliard dollars. The talk is about development of oil-gas and ore fields as well as of energy, transport and tourist infrastructure.

According to Vladimir Barbin, Russia is open for international cooperation in all these directions not only with countries-members of the Arctic Council but with all other countries that are interested in making contribution to sustainable development of this region.

“Public-private partnership will be the main tool in fulfillment of large-scale projects in the Russian part of the Arctic. This assumes that the lion’s share of allocations in the project will go not from the budget, but from private companies. Naturally, in fulfillment of large investment projects it is important to ensure precise distribution of responsibilities between the state and investors”, the Ambassador said.

A draft law on development of the Arctic is being actively discussed; it supposes to focus on formation of supporting areas for development of the Arctic zone. Adoption of this law will give a powerful impulse for investments, including foreign ones.

Vladimir Barbin notes that it is necessary to focus on development of arctic tourism. In his opinion, large projects grow out of small ones. Thus, now in Singapore they dream of snow, they even have a cafe “Arctic”, and in Norway they discuss, what will be the thickness of snow cover in 10 years.

The deputy governor of Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Okrug Alexander Kalinin jokes that Yamal is ready to export snow and to deliver skiers. In the near future the region will not face shortage of snow.