Department of International Relations and opera : Meeting with Russian Direct Investment Fund CEO Kirill Dmitriev

President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Good afternoon, Mr Dmitriev.

How was the year? What are you plans?

Russian Direct Investment Fund CEO Kirill Dmitriev Dmitriev KirillCEO of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) : Mr President, thank you very much for your support for the Russian Direct Investment Fund. We had a very successful end of the year. Together with our partners, we invested 365 billion rubles in the Russian economy. The RDIF provided 30 billion of its own money and the rest came from our partners. This means that we attracted about 10 rubles from our partners per every ruble of our own.

The year's results show a very significant increase in direct foreign investment as well. Our forecast was 70 percent but we can see that it could be even several times higher. When it comes to direct foreign investment in non-banking industries, the growth can be fourfold compared to last year. We believe that Russia has reached a very stable trend of direct foreign investment growth in the future.

We are investing in the sectors you specified in your May Executive Orders and the Address to the Federal Assembly. These are sectors related to the quality of life, healthcare, environment, etc. For example, the RDIF and the French company Orpea are investing in centres for the rehabilitation and support of the elderly. It will be one of the largest networks in this sector in Russia.

We also invested in Motorica, a developer of absolutely innovative prosthetic limbs both in Russia and the world. We invested in waste recycling together with a Spanish operator that will be providing services to 600,000 people and basically recycling 70 percent of all waste in Kaliningrad Region.

We can also see that companies in our portfolio are demonstrating very significant growth. In 2019, their returns grew by 13 percent and profits by 24 percent. This means we are selecting up-and-coming Russian companies with a good potential of growth and give them the opportunity to grow faster.

Some of our new and interesting projects include a hydropower plant in Karelia that was test-launched in late 2019, and a fast tram in St Petersburg that will carry 33 million passengers twice as fast. Another project is the Tushino Technopark, covering 600,000 square metres, that was built at a record pace, within two years. As soon as this year, we expect that the technopark will have 26,000 families living and 20,000 employees working on its territory.

To be continued.