MOSCOW, April 26 (Itar-Tass) —— The presidium of the Russian government will convene for its last meeting on Thursday, April 26, to discuss a long-term development scenario up to 2030, an updated forecast for 2013-2015, and amendments to the federal budget for the next three years.
Minister of Economic Development Elvira Nabiullina will speak on the first issue. Her ministry has drafted a scenario of long-term development of Russia: a conservative scenario (based on energy and raw materials) and an innovation one.
Under the first scenario, the average annual GDP growth rate in 2011-2030 will be 3.6 percent, investments in fixed capital will grow at a rate of 5.3 percent, real wages will increase by 4.3 percent and retail trade turnover by 4.1 percent. The budget will become balanced after 2015 under this scenario.
Under the second scenario, the average annual GDP growth rate in 2011-2030 will be 4.4 percent, investments in fixed capital will grow at a rate of 6.4 percent, real wages will increase by 5.2 percent and retail trade turnover by 4.8 percent. Average annual inflation will decrease from 4.8 percent in 2012 to 3 percent in 2030, with prices (tariffs) for the products and services of infrastructure monopolies growing faster.
This scenario envisions that labour productivity by 2030 will grow 2.5 times from 2010, the share of knowledge-based economy, machine-building, telecom and communications in GDP will grow 1.8 times, the energy intensity of GDP will decrease by 46 percent.
Russia will rise from sixth place by the size of the economy in 2011 to fifth place in 2014-2021, its share in the world economy will grow from 3 percent in 2010 to 3.7 percent in 2030.
Under the innovation scenario, federal budget deficit will be 1.2-0.9 percent of GDP in 2015-2030 and the state debt will increase to 25-30 percent of GDP by 2030.
Nabiullina will also present an updated forecast of socio-economic development in the next three years. According to the forecast, the price of Urals blend will rise from 100 to 115 U.S. dollars per barrel, retail trade turnover will grow from 5.5 percent to 6.3 percent, the real effective exchange rate of the rouble will increase from 0.2 percent to 4.4 percent, GDP growth will slow down from 3.7 percent to 3.4 percent, investments in fixed capital will drop from 7.8 percent to 6.6. percent, average annual inflation will go down from 5.3 percent to 4.8 percent.
Finance Minister Anton Siluanov will present amendments to the federal budget for 2012 and the projected period of 2013-2014.
The Finance Ministry expects federal budget revenue to amount to 12.677 trillion roubles compared to 11.78 trillion roubles approved earlier, expenditures will total 12.745 trillion roubles (compared to 12.656 trillion roubles approved earlier), the federal budget deficit in 2012 will be 68.144 billion roubles (compared to 876.589 billion roubles), i.e. it will decrease 13 times from 1.5 percent of GDP to 0.1 percent.
The amendments put federal budget expenditures in 2012 at 12.745 billion roubles, an increase of 88.7 billion roubles from the amount approved in the law on the federal budget for this year.