November 24 2004, 10:59

Rates of increase of agricultural products imports to Russia are more than three times higher than rates of increase in domestic production - agriculture minister

Rates of increase of agricultural products imports to Russia are more than three time higher than the rates of increase in domestic production, which poses a question of economic feasibility of the activities of local agricultural producers - this opinion was expressed by Russian Minister of Agriculture Aleksey Gordeyev, who spoke to the State Duma (the lower chamber of Russian Parliament) about the situation and outlook of the country's farming complex.

According to Gordeyev, the country's faming complex will continue to develop in difficult economic conditions, which are characterised by huge deficit of financial resources, undermined technical and material basis, low effective demand and high dynamics of foodstuffs imports. According to him, all of this creates prerequisites for extermination of agricultural production in Russia.

The minister has listed the issues that are to be the subject of close attention of the government. Among them there are creation of conditions for development of territories, stepping-up of social infrastructure, improvement in reproduction of the natural resources, first of all - the ploughing land. These proposals will be formulated in the draft-law "About Development of Agriculture and Foodstuffs Market in Russian Federation", which is being now amended jointly with the Deputies of the State Duma.