OREANDA-NEWS. March 4, 2011. On March 1 St.-Petersburg was a venue for the conference where mechanisms of implementation of the Strategy for the federal district development in the next 10 years were discussed at participation of heads of the Northwest region. The main aim of the strategy is to involve investments in regions, and the central topic of the conference was achievement of this goal.

As Head of Karelia Andrei Nelidov has pointed out, there is a number of key problems with which regions will not be able to cope with without assistance of the federal center; however, at the same time without solution of these problems successful development of regions is in doubt. First of all, Andrei Nelidov has emphasized the role of transport infrastructure which is a basis of economy. "If we spend the budget of Karelia on construction of roads we will be able to build about 100 kilometers. – Head of Karelia said. – Almost all the other constituent entities face similar situation. Budgeting goes in such a manner that there is almost no money for roads in regions. Until this question is solved it remains the main brake on development of constituent entities of the Northwest, and Russia as a whole." In Andrei Nelidov's opinion, there should occur either a redistribution of tax proceeds so that target funds for transport infrastructure development remain in regions, or the Russian Federation should undertake these powers entirely.

The second problem is housing and communal services and the energy sector on which quality people's life depends. In particular, Andrei Nelidov has specified contradictions and incongruities in methods of generation of tariffs and prices of energy carriers. "For six years the authority has been obviously building absolutely wrong figures into the tariff, and then calling sponsors to invest in the branch," – Head of Karelia has pointed out. As a result, the history of local enterprises of housing and communal services remains a continuous sequence of annual bankruptcies. Quality and reliability of services is equivalent. "No effective concept of development may be built on miscalculations," – Andrei Nelidov has emphasized.

Head of Karelia has also mentioned the necessity of competent, careful planning of points of economic growth that is especially actual for the countryside where consequences of Soviet approach to economic planning show untill now. "It is not necessary to try to grow garden radishes in the north, and coniferous wood – in the south," – Andrei Nelidov has emphasized. – There is no strategic task to provide food self-sufficiency of every region; however, there is a task to establish profit-making productions." Participants of the conference understood the statement of the Head of Karelia. The final strategy of development of the Northwest will be presented at the session of the Government of Russia this June.