UrBC, Moscow, August 20, 2018. A bill proposed by Russia’s Communications Ministry is now available on the federal web portal for draft laws and regulations. Under the terms of the proposed legislation, mobile carriers will have to use Federal Security Service-approved encryption for their SIM cards, which might mean all current subscribers would have to switch to new-format SIMs. So far, an amendment has been made to the bill following negotiations with the country’s leading ISPs/mobile carriers and experts (MTS, VimpelCom, MegaFon, Rostelecom, and the International Communications Academy)

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, August 20, 2018. Koltsovo Airport Customs officers detained a number of international-flight passengers with more than RUR 10m in cash they were trying to take on board undeclared, Ural Customs Administration’s press service reports. A female traveler going to Tel Aviv had $13,000, €2,000, and slightly over RUR 20,000 in her luggage. A passenger flying from Yekaterinburg to Hudzhand had a little more than RUR 1m on him in cash. A passenger on Yekaterinburg-Dushanbe flight was trying to take $10,000 and RUR 27,000 on board. All of the offenders chose the green route and

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, August 20, 2018. Sverdlovsk Region-based farms and self-employed farmers produced 4.7m eggs in January-July 2018, which was 20.3% less than one year previously, Sverdlovskstat reports. On the other hand, dairy produce output rose by 3.8% (up to 24,400,000 kg), that of meat and poultry (live-weight basis) rose by 8.3% (up to 1,300,000 kg). On the whole, all of Sverdlovsk Region-based agribusinesses’ milk output increased by 3% (up to 434,500,000 kg), that of meat and poultry by 6.1% (up to 142,900,000 kg), and that of eggs dropped by 0.8% (down to 863.6m).

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, August 17, 2018. ChelPipe Group is setting up ProyekTY Social Skills School for the local business community in Perovuralsk, Sverdlovsk Region, the company press service reports. The education project is part of the agreement ChelPipe Group’s Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant (PNTZ) signed with Pervouralsk Council and Sverdlovsk Region’s Business Support Foundation. ‘A course at our school offers quality business training for the students and provides them with the skills necessary to develop and launch projects to handle the town’s socially important issues. This is a

UrBC, Tobolsk, August 17, 2018. Every summer, Federal Grid Company United Energy Systems coordinates a summer jobs campaign for students, FGC UES Western Siberia’s PR & Media Group reports. ‘College students can get practical experience at our power grid facilities and on our construction sites; they can demonstrate their professional skills there and perhaps even find a steady job at our company. Young people from Surgut State University’s Laser Team spent a month working at FGC UES Western Siberia’s 500-kilowatt Tobol Power Substation in Tobolsk, for example,’ the company says. The

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, August 17, 2018. A dike dam is nearly complete at Magnitogorsk Water Reservoir; the dike is part of Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works’ (MMK) water recycling system upgrades. The new dike, which cost the company some RUR 660m, will reduce the plant’s environmental impact considerably, MMK Information, PR & Advertising Department reports. ‘The dike dam will help decrease the volume of waste water dumped into the reservoir by eleven times, from 52,000 m3/hour down to 4,500 m3/hour, whereas the overall mass of dumped water will go down by seven times. This will insure

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, August 17, 2018. 4,943,434 people flew with Ural Airlines in the seven months of 2018 (up 16% on a year earlier), the air carrier’s press service reports. 2,737,604 passengers used the airline’s domestic flights, 1,271,939 passengers went on international flights, and 933,891 passengers used the airline’s flights to and from the NIS member states. The passenger turnover rose by 17% and came to 11,818,954,000,000 passenger-kilometers. As for the month of July, the airline offered its services to 1,002,952 customers last month, including 562,652 passengers on domestic

UrBC, Moscow, August 17, 2018. Russians Believe the U.S. currency is going to keep strengthening against the Russian ruble in the short term, so that the USD/RUR exchange rate will exceed 1/71.56 by September 1, 2018, Superjob’s latest research findings indicate. 33% of Russians surveyed said they believed the ruble was still the best currency for their savings; 21% of respondents went for the dollar and 15% chose the euro as their preferred currency. 11% of those surveyed believe in making their savings in other currencies such as the renminbi, the pounds sterling, and the yen, or in

UrBC, Moscow, August 16, 2018. The price of jet fuel might increase by around 30% by the end of 2018 against one year previously, TASS refers to Russia’s Transport Minister Evgeny Ditrikh as stating. According to the Transport Ministry, airlines’ losses incurred through soaring jet fuel prices will amount to RUR 50bn by the end of the year, which is why the ministry suggested that the Russian Government and the Finance Ministry might partially compensate the air carriers for their extra expenses. The amounts proposed might come to RUR 22.5bn from the budget funds. ‘We expect the overall

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, August 16, 2018. ChelPipe Group’s Gagarinsky Sports Facility in Pervouralsk embarked on its summer job counseling program, the company press service reports. More than five hundred talented children aged 6.5 to 17 from all over Russia joined the program. There are tech crafts workshops available for the program participants to help them develop their engineering and designing skills, spatial intelligence, interest in precise sciences, and teamwork skills. The children will also learn about engineering graphics, prototyping, LEGO design, and metal treatment. Additionally,

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, August 16, 2018. A consumer loan issued by Sverdlovsk Region-based banks in the second quarter of the year amounted to RUR 209,900 on average, the National Credit History Bureau’s data indicate. This is up 24.6% on one year earlier, when the average consumer loan amount stood at RUR 168,400. Sverdlovsk Region comes 6th in the national rating in terms of average consumer loan amounts. In the country on the whole, the average consumer loan amount came to RUR 196,800 in the second quarter of 2018, which exceeds the figures for one year earlier (RUR 145,200) by 35.5%. ‘The

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, August 16, 2018. MegaFon is now Russia’s first ISP and mobile carrier to offer the trade-in options for badly damaged iPhones, the company press service reports. Starting August 13, you can trade your Apple 4s and later versions in; the company’s 1,300 outlets in thirty-two Russian constituencies now accept devices with any kind of cracks and chipped surfaces. The only proviso is that the screen sensor still works and all the images and menu panels still get displayed properly. ‘Judging by our stats, iPhones of all generations are the most popular trade-in devices with

UrBC, Nizhniy Tagil, August 16, 2018. EVRAZ Holding’s Nizhniy Tagil Intergraed Metallurgical Works (NTMK) sent over 700,000 kg of H-beams off to a would-be international cruise liner and freight/passenger ship seaport in Pionersky, Kaliningrad Region, the company press service reports. The 40K H-beams (length: 12 meters) are meant for the construction of the quays. The port is scheduled to open at the end of 2019. Pionersky is located quite conveniently to serve as a hub of a large destination network for cruise liners and freight/passenger ships. The terminal will have all the necessary

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, August 15, 2018. Yekaterinburg banks report their customers are growing increasingly more interested in placing their savings onto dollar/euro deposits due to the recent weakening of the Russian ruble against the U.S. dollar and the Euro. ‘The demand for foreign currency deposits is on the rise. The number of newly opened deposits went up by 7% in August compared with July. Our customers are trying to make money out of both the interest payments and the exchange rate fluctuations,’ the Ural Bank for Reconstruction & Development’s press service reports. Now the Russian

UrBC, Moscow, August 15, 2018. The U.S. Congress’s bill on sanctions against Russia is now available on its website. To strengthen the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, to combat international cybercrime, and to impose additional sanctions with respect to the Russian Federation, and for other purposes (short title: Defending American Security from Kremlin Aggression Act of 2018), TASS reports. The bill was introduced by Sen. Robert Menendez, a Democrat of New Jersey; Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC); Sen. John McCain (R-AZ); Sen. Cory Gardner (R-CO); Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD); and Sen. Cynthia

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, August 15, 2018. MMK Kurort Management Company presented its performance report for the year 2018 so far and voiced its plans to upgrade Abzakovo and Bannoye Resorts (located, respectively, in Beloretsky and Abzelilovsky in Bashkortostan), MMK Information, PR & Advertising Department reports. The management company underwent some organizational changes this year, so that Abzakovo Resort made part of MMK Kurort. This means the company now manages both locations, Abzakovo and Bannoye. MMK Kurort is now integrating all the divisions to create a single sales and marketing

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, August 15, 2018. 77% of MegaFon’s Sverdlovsk Region-based customers are now using 4G devices, which exceeds the figures for one year earlier by 45%, the company press service reports. MegaFon’s engineers have recently completed their 4G construction project, with twenty-three new LTE stations installed in Sverdlovsk Region all in all. The mobile Internet connection is now even faster in Yekaterinburg, Nizhniy Tagil, Berezovsky, Verkhnyaya Pyshma, Pervouralsk, Sredneuralsk, Sysert, and Aramil. MegaFon’s 4G network’s extended coverage means the data transfer speed is now

UrBC, Chelyabinsk, August 15, 2018. Maxim Koryakin, who is currently a student on ChelPipe Group’s Future of White-Coated Metallurgy Corporate Training Program, won silver in the 6th WorldSkills Russia blue-collar job championship in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk. Koryakin competed (as member of Sverdlovsk Region’s team) in Reverse Engineering, the Group’s press service reports. The corporate program students Artem Ulyanov and Mikhail Sokhrannov also made it to Sverdlovsk Region’s team in the contest. They were, respectively, among the championship’s top ten and top five finalists. The national

UrBC, Moscow, August 14, 2018. International tour operators warn that staying in Turkey will cost Russian customers 5% more in the next season after the ruble grew weaker against the U.S. dollar and the euro again, Russia’s Association of Tour Operators reports. As the market players explain, the simultaneous weakening of the Turkish lira isn’t going to offset the tour prices, as all the agents involved use dollars in their cash settlements. It is estimated that a trip to Turkey might grow 5%+ more expensive by the time next season hits. The USD/RUR exchange rate exceeded 1/68 for the first

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, August 14, 2018. MMK Group’s vehicle department Avtotransportnoye Upravleniye issued a performance report in celebration of a special day: the department was set up on August 13, 1969. The company is now one of the Southern Urals’ leading vehicle and transportation businesses with over a thousand rolling stock and automobile/truck units at its disposal. The department also maintains a large production facilities network, MMK’s press service reports. Avtotransportnoye Upravleniye contributes greatly to the area’s socioeconomic development and handles both MMK’s cargo (the