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Russia's defense industry

Russia to boost defense procurement 50% to ensure 97% troop provision with weapons

Sergey Shoigu pointed to the importance of keeping production at its full capacity and ensuring early deliveries to the troops

Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu Russian Foreign Ministry Press Service/TASS

Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu

© Russian Foreign Ministry Press Service/TASS

MOSCOW, November 30. /TASS/. Russia’s 2023 defense procurement plan will grow by 50% to ensure that Russian troops are 97% supplied with armaments and military equipment, Defense Minister Army General Sergey Shoigu said at the ministry’s board meeting on Wednesday.

"Next year, considering extra budget funds, the defense procurement plan will practically grow by 50%. This will help ensure that constant alert units and formations are 97% supplied with armaments and hardware," the defense chief said.

Shoigu pointed to the importance of keeping production at its full capacity and ensuring early deliveries to the troops. The defense chief stressed that it was necessary to continue modernization and the development of state-of-the-art weapons with their subsequent use in the special military operation in Ukraine.

The defense procurement plan is based on the country’s state armament program. The scope of the defense procurement plan is not revealed. The current state armament program is effective for the period of 2018-2027 and stipulates 20 trillion rubles (around $330 billion in current prices) in funds (according to the 2018 data).

Roscosmos Chief Yury Borisov who earlier held the post of deputy prime minister overseeing the defense industry (2018-2022) said that the defense procurement plan had been 98% fulfilled, following the results of 2021. Borisov also said in early April that a new state armament program would focus on creating qualitatively new and fundamentally new armaments, including directed energy and kinetic weapons and also control systems based on artificial intelligence and robotic vehicles.

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