YAKUTSK, March 26. /TASS/. The new federal law on the Northern Supplies will expand significantly the list of available food products, Yakutia' s Ministry for Development of the Arctic and for Affairs of the Peoples of the North told TASS.

According to the ministry, the main changes to the Northern Supplies mechanism will begin in 2025. The law's certain provisions have a deferred effect and will be implemented from 2026. Generally speaking, 2024 is the year to develop, update regulations and to put together the state budget in compliance with provisions of the new federal law, the ministry said.

"The law and by-laws are connected, we may say, with a crucial change in the food supply system. While we have subsidized 12 types of products, classified as socially significant food products, under the new list of the Northern Supplies' goods, approved by the Russian Federation's government, 73 food products are subject to subsidies. This means that most products in shops would be brought with state support and sold with a limited trade premium," the ministry continued.

Thus, the region will continue to ensure the economic and physical accessibility of food products to residents of remote, hard-to-reach settlements, the ministry added.

Support for trade and logistics centers

Yakutia's Arctic Trade and Logistics Company is engaged in year-round shipment of socially significant food products to the region's Arctic districts and to remote settlements. According to the company's CEO Saidam Stepanov, under the new law, the company hopes to receive three-year loans from the federal budget. "During the work with the Ministry for Development of the Far East and Arctic [to draft the bill], we explained we needed a budget loan for a term of three years: food products' turnover here is between 2.5 and 3 years," he said.

Under earlier regulations, the company used loans from the regional budget, allocated for a period of one year. "This does not correspond to the turnover of food products in the Arctic districts. Here, it takes a year and a half to take food products to end consumers. And then, with installments for one year, they are sold in remote and hard-to-reach settlements," he explained.

The company's representative pointed to the support of trade and logistics centers, being built in Yakutia's Arctic districts. In compliance with instructions from the region's Governor Aisen Nikolaev, by the end of 2025, trade and logistics centers should appear in all the 13 Arctic districts. Eight centers of the kind are operating in the Arctic Zone so far.

"The costs to maintain these facilities are growing. In order not to include them in the trade allowance for food products, of course, we count on reimbursements from the federal budget - in compliance with the law's article on supporting the backbone network of transport and logistics infrastructures in the Northern Supplies," he continued.

The Northern Supplies to Yakutia are known to use mostly land, river and air transport. "In the current version of the law, subsidies to reimburse transport costs are defined specifically for shipments along the Northern Sea Route. In our region, most cargo deliveries are by winter roads, or during navigation - by the fleet, as well as by air," he said.

The Northern Supplies

The Northern Supplies is a set of measures for the smooth supply of basic vital goods to the Far North. The deliveries are limited in the complicated climate conditions. Goods are brought to the North by air, river and sea transport, including along the Northern Sea Route.

The work to improve further the Northern Supplies mechanism has been ordered by Russia's President Vladimir Putin. In August 2023, he signed a law on the Northern Supplies' legal aspects and procedures.