Today the president of KBR Arsen Kanokov made a traditional Address to the Parliament of the Republic. Members of the Federal State Duma of the RF, the Government, the Parliament, the Ombudsman, the main Federal Inspector for KBR, judges, heads of the Prosecutor’s office, Chamber of Accounts and Public Chamber, heads of municipalities, representatives of political parties, science, creative communities, confessions and public associations, journalists took part in the meeting.

Unlike previous ones, the present Address of the head of Kabardino-Balkaria covers not only the past year, but also resumes the four-year period of the life of the Republic, marks the main trends and perspectives of the development of the society for the year 2010 and the forthcoming five years.

Arsen Kanokov said that in spite of the acute lack of finance, KBR authorities are not going to backtrack on the strategy declared four years ago. The aim of this strategy was ‘creation of democratic society with high life standards and modern economics, which will be integrated into the Russian and World economics’.

The President referred to figures to show the dynamics of the development of KBR economics during the last four years. The state treasury has grown 2,8 times more and reached 20,4 billion rubles. Trends of growth of the republican budget are bigger than those of many Russian constituent territories. Its average annual increase comes to 30%. Federal loaning of the consolidate budget decreased considerably down to 54,4%. For the first time the Republic is not included in the list of the regions highly dependent on Federal loans. A number of modern enterprises were put into action. In comparison with 36, 8 billion rubles in 2005, the total value of the Gross Domestic Product in the past year reached 64, 4 billion rubles. Though the volume of industrial production grew almost 2 times, this sector of the economy ‘requires intensive activities for structural reconstruction, extension of specialization and intensification of activities of enterprises, development of new technologies and new goods production, growth of investment attractiveness’.

Establishing highly efficient and competitive tourism and health resort industry, increasing the share of recreational complex in the republican GDP was called the main task ‘of the year 2010 and for the many years ahead’.

Power and gas industries are to be structurally changed. In accordance with special conditions of operation on the wholesale electricity market for the republics of the North Caucasian Federal District, adopted by the Government of the RF, this year KBR can buy the whole needed volume of electricity at administered prices, under the condition of 100% timely payment. That is why the President of the KBR aimed the Government, heads of municipalities and power distributors at strictly obeying the payment discipline. Completion of the construction of the second series of Nizhne-Chereksky hydroelectric power plant, together with erection of small hydroelectric power plants, giving the republic an opportunity to be fully supplied with self-produced electricity, was declared to be the most significant task.

Agriculture may become the leader of the economic growth. The employees of this branch compose 22% of the people involved in the republican economics, and at the same time, total contribution to the GDP is 28% and around 38% to the taxation income of the republican budget system. Owing to purposeful state support for agricultural producers, the republic has reached a significant increase of total volume of agricultural goods. In 2009 the gross index of agricultural goods production in the republic came to 104, 3%. The whole branch has experienced serious structural changes. The shares of large agricultural commodities production and that of the live stock breading have risen. However, in spite of the evident success in the agro-industrial complex, the Government and the branch Ministry were set the task to 'continue the development of the priority trends of the agro-industrial complex, application of the effective agro production technologies and modernization of food industry'.

The republic is keeping up high pace of the construction – during the last four years 130 housing projects and 968, 6 thousand square meters of dwelling were built and put into service. Arsen Kanokov informed that in 2010 according to the existing building contracts at least 7 billion rubles must be spent to construct 265 thousand square meters of dwelling. Special attention is paid to the development of the new 'Vostochny' district in Nalchik, where more than 1 million square meters of housing is planned to be commissioned.

552 kilometers of highways and 1879 running meters of road bridges were put into operation during the period between 2006 and 2009.  Maintenance of municipal roads was considered to be one of the main tasks, so 155 km. of roads were set into operation and 500 socially significant buildings were modernly equipped. At the same time, still there are a number of relevant road construction issues to be settled. 'Though the coverage of the republic with hard top roads seems to be quite enough, a significant part of roads doesn't correspond to standards. The pace of the new technologies implementation to raise the quality, durability and safety of roads is rather slow. In 2010 the state plans to invest 745, 5 million rubles in the road construction, including 414, 4 million rubles from the republican budget. We must ensure maximum effectiveness of these big investments' – Arsen Kanokov said. Construction of the Nalchik detour road on the 'Kavkaz' highway together with building of the new road Kislovosk – Narzan Valley – Dzhily-Su – Elbrus are considered to become the main priority road-building issues of the present year. There is a vast amount of work to be done on the access roads to installations of health-recreational complex. More than 67% of the quoted commitments will be assigned to these tasks.

Coming back to the question of the new economy model, Arsen Kanokov reminded that this is the issue of technological modernization and innovative development - so called smart economics model. 'This can be fully applied to the economy of our republic, including not only business and economic management spheres, but also all forms of science – academic, higher educational and applied one. But we must confess that in KBR we don't have a thoroughly elaborated mechanism for an effective cooperation between science, business and economic management yet. This problem should be resolved without delay', - stressed the President.

Business support is also an important trend. KBR authorities pay much attention to it. As it was mentioned in the Address, over 275 million rubles of the budget money was allotted for this aim, which is 40 times more than in the year 2005. A whole set of measures is realized in the Republic to support business. Business-incubators are opened, youth projects are financed. Support of this sector of the economy becomes actual and important in the present controversial economic conditions. That is why the Government and KBR Ministry of Economy are ordered to concentrate on 'the introduction of new, progressive financial technologies, aimed to significantly increase flow of investments in this domain'.

Touching upon the questions of the budget policy Arsen Kanokov assured that the budget of the year 2010 will remain socially oriented, thus socio-cultural expenses will make 65%.  Indexation of monthly allowances will be provided for various categories of the population, such as families of dependant children, labor veterans, home front workers, and the rehabilitated. At the same time house services fees for rural workers of the budget sphere, scholarships for orphans and children without parent's charge will be indexed.

'I would like to emphasize that despite the necessity to increase the social component of the budget, resources to support the real sector of the economy, the small business are provided in it. We shall keep the developed mechanisms in the form of subsidies for the interest rates on investment loans, grants for agriculture etc'.

You can see that the republican budget is not just a simple description of receipts and expenditures, but a practical development scheme', - he said.

The president also touched upon the crisis. He mentioned additional finance investment in the economy “through the usage of mechanisms of public and private partnerships” as one of the crisis management measures. To accomplish this aim, realization of large investment projects has been taken under the sate control on “10 plus 10” formula. “Realization of this scheme will enable us create enterprises which will replace imported goods and food. Moreover more than 5 thousand jobs will be created” – said the head of the republic.

Arsen Kanokov believes we must 'use in full new opportunities provided by the newly established North Caucasian Federal District'. The office of the Plenipotentiary Envoy must work out a complex strategy of social and economic development of the district. 'We must elaborate a set of our offers including a considerable investment projects' portfolio, to become a part of KBR development Strategy to 2030', - said the President. He suggested that everyone present should join this task and forward their offers.

Among the main issues in the spheres of education, health care and information policy are impartial evaluation of the remuneration of labor depending on the results, target support for the talented youth, improvement of quality and availability of services, shifting to digital broadcasting.

Arsen Kanokov called everyone to get rid of bureaucracy and corruption, having marked that fighting against them is the task for all bodies of power, political and public institutions, and every citizen. According to the KBR President, consolidation of the society is one of the most important tasks. 'I'm sure that in spite of any possible disagreement, all public forces must act in accordance with the principle: nothing should be done to the prejudice of Kabardino-Balkaria, but we must do our best for its good and for the wellbeing of each citizen'.

For the first time there was a live broadcast of the Address on the state channel 'Kabardino-Balkaria' (49 channel) and on the web site of the VGTRK-GTRK 'Kabardino-Balkaria' branch = http://vestikbr.ru