UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 28, 2015. Vyacheslav Popov, an electrician from Chelyabinsk Tube Rolling Plant/ChTPZ was awarded the Order For Merit to the Fatherland (1st Class) by the Russian Federation President's decree, the company press service reports. The award was given out by Plenipotentiary Representative of Russian Federation President in Ural Federal District Igor Kholmanskikh. 'The future of this country depends on just how independent we grow from imported produce and how efficiently we make our own. It's no secret the blue-collar jobs have lost their prestige

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 25, 2015. The Russian market for cession of bank indebtedness went up by 42% since the start of the year compared with a year earlier and currently amounts to 245bn RUR, Sequoia Credit Consolidation reports. This signifies the biggest increase in the last three years against 125.2bn RUR in the nine months of 2013 and 172bn RUR in the nine months of 2014. A number of major banks put their debt portfolios up to auction in the third quarter of the year, making some 12bn RUR altogether. The structure of the portfolios was complemented by the new share of mortgage

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 25, 2015. 100+ Forum Russia 2015, an engineering and construction conference with a focus on skyscrapers, opened in Yekaterinburg, the city council reports. The solemn opening ceremony was attended by Russia’s Deputy Construction Minister Elena Sierra, Mayor of Yekaterinburg and Chairman of Yekaterinburg Duma Evgeniy Roizman, Head of Yekaterinburg Council Alexander Yakob, and Soviet of the Federation Senator for Sverdlovsk Region Arkadiy Chernetsky. ‘Local developers have plenty of experience and expertise in high-rise construction. It has been proven that we

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 25, 2015. The number of Sverdlovsk Region’s jobless came to 136,100 people in September 2015, Rosstat reports, while the number of working-age population stood at 2303,800 people. In the whole of Russia, the number of people out of jobs rose by 326,000 people in the course of the year. The overall number of the unemployed is now 4.3 times bigger than the number of those who registered with the government employment centers (956,000 people as of late August 2015). On average, a person out of job is 35.2 years old; 28.5% of them are in the under-25 age group

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 25, 2015. 28,555 new automobiles were sold in Yekaterinburg between January and August 2015, which was 44% less than a year earlier, Auto Dealer Yekaterinburg reports. ‘August proved a record-setting month for this year, as local dealers managed to sell 4,109 units (down 26% on last August),’ the company says. Lada is still the market leader, even though it was Hyundai whose sales figures were the largest in August; the latter brand used to be No.1 on Yekaterinburg car market throughout the entire first half of the year. As for the top ten best-selling brands,

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 25, 2015. Employees of Burevestnik Research Institute (a member enterprise of Uralvagonzavod Corporation) won the S.I. Mosin award, the company press service reports. ‘A team of the company employees were awarded for the development of a new-generation mortar weaponry, namely, the 120mm mortar unit 2S12A, the 82m mortar gun 2B24, and the noiseless mortar gun 2B25,’ the press service says. The S.I. Mosin Prize commemorates a prominent Russian engineer S. Mosin and is one of the country’s oldest awards in the military goods design and development sector. Over

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 24, 2015. Rosstat reports 30.8% of companies in the Russian construction industry turned out to be incurring losses between January and July 2015; this exceeds the figures for a year earlier by 2.2%. The share of loss-making businesses is also rising in the communications sector (up from 29.8% to 34%), communal housing services sector (up from 38.4% to 40.5%), and transportation sector (up from 39.7% to 41%). However, the overall share of non-profit-making companies went down by 0.7% compared with last year and amounted to 31.2% of all Russian businesses. The

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 24, 2015. Sverdlovsk Region Public Housing & Construction Surveillance Department inspected 4,345,140 m2 of local housing in August 2015 to uncover 2,789 violations of the Housing Code regulations, the department’s press service reports. 1,717 violations had to do with failure to comply with the O&M requirements (including 9 instances of non-compliance with the gas facilities operation requirements, 841 cases of violating the information transparency legislature, 101 instances of failure to provide good quality housing services, 42 instances where

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 24, 2015. Sverdlovsk Region Property Fund is putting four state-owned land allotments up to auction, their press service reports. The offer is to rent the said allotments to developers interested in low-rise housing construction. Lot 1: an allotment at 44A Krasnaya St in Gorny Shchit meant for 1,045m2 worth of prospective housing, with a twenty-year rental contract. Lot 2: an allotment in Naberezhnaya St in Severka meant for 908 m2 worth of prospective housing, with a twenty-year rental contract. Lot 3: an allotment at 25/2 Torfyanaya St in Palkinsky Torfyanik

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 24, 2015. The overall amount of past-due tax payments, fines, tax penalties, Uniform Social Tax payments, and payments to non-state, non-budgetary funds decreased by 942m RUR, or 2.9% in Sverdlovsk Region last month and thus amounted to 31,566m RUR on September 1, 2015, the local division of Russia's Federal Tax Service reports. This means that the amount of past-due tax payments went down by 516m RUR (2.3%) and came to 22,408m RUR all in all, while that of past-due fines and tax penalties went down by 426m RUR (4.5%) and came to 8,948m RUR altogether.

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 24, 2015. Chelyabinsk Tractor Plant (a member enterprise of Uralvagonzavod Corporation) is about to ship a set of five B14 bulldozers to Vietnam. According to Uralvagonzavod Corporation's press service, the machines have already been assembled, commissioned, and accepted by the customer, whose dealer and representative came to the plant specially for the purpose. The plant's Foreign Sales Director Vladimir Klein says the acceptance tests went through smoothly, so the tractors are now being partially disassembled and packed into shipping containers.

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 23, 2015. Sverdlovsk Railways will cancel nine of its commuter trains for the winter, the company press service reports. Starting September 27, 2015, the following routes will be affected: Druzhinino-Mikhailovsky Zavod, Yekaterinburg-Revda, Yekaterinburg-Kamensk Uralsky, Yekaterinburg-Nizhniy Tagil, Nizhniy Tagil-Kushva, and Yekaterinburg-Polevskoy. The overall number of commuter trains will be cut by two for each direction. Starting September 28, 2015, trains from Serov to Boksity will no longer be available. Starting October 25, 2015, commuter trains from

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 23, 2015. Head of Yekaterinburg Council Alexander Yakob and the Metropolitan of Yekaterinburg and Verkhoturye, His Holiness Kirill signed an agreement on the prospective construction of twenty new Orthodox churches in the city on September 21, 2015. The city council reports the churches will be located on the outskirts of the city and in new residential districts. The Metropolitan explained that some of the churches will be dedicated to special events, such as one hundred years after the end of the First World War and the 400th anniversary of the House of

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 23, 2015. The average price of a room in Yekaterinburg hotels went down by 14% in 2015 compared with a year earlier and thus came to 3,211 RUR per night, Oktogo.ru reports. Travelers stay for three days on average. Yekaterinburg, however, did not make it to the list of Russia’s ten cheapest cities to come to. Bryansk (2,343 RUR per hotel room on average) was No.1 in this rating, and Anapa (3,082 RUR) No.10. In the country on the whole, the average price of a night’s stay at a hotel decreased by 5%, down to 3,484 RUR, while that of a stay in a foreign hotel rose

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 23, 2015. ChTPZ Group directed over 25m RUR to cover costs of vacations for 3,200 of its employees working at Chelyabinsk Tube Rolling Plant and Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant, the company press service reports. Under the company’s Corporate Vacation Program, the Group covers part of the travel and accommodation costs for its workers and invests in summer recreation infrastructure development. ‘We always invest quite a bit in our summer camps and company health resorts. Running our own recreational infrastructure means we can offer our employees some affordable,

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 23, 2015. An upgraded 1000 ton-force strong press KB 8340 was newly installed at Uralvagonzavod Corporation’s head plant recently. The new piece of equipment is meant for stamping and bending of parts for railcars and special vehicles, the company press service reports. ‘The startup and commissioning jobs were completed by experts from a Barnaul-based plant. This upgrade was part of our import replacement program. The quality of this Russian machine is flawless, and now that the press control system has been improved, it offers much better value for money than

UrBC, Moscow, September 22, 2015. Russia’s foreign trade turnover shrank by 33.6% between January and July 2015 and amounted to $321.1bn. Rosstat reports export was down by 30.3% ($210.2bn), import by 39.2% (110.9bn). The balance of trade stood at $99.2bn. The decrease in imports was mainly due to such items as cars and other vehicles and equipment: 44.5% less of those got imported in Russia in the first half of the year ($44,957m in money terms). The decrease in exports had to do with shrinking supply of oil and other fossils (-37.3%, down to $136.23bn). The foreign trade figures changed

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 22, 2015. A power outage in Sysert left 8,000 people without any electric power supply for an hour. According to the Ministry of Emergencies’ Sverdlovsk Region division, the accident was reported at 3:55 PM. ‘The electric power supply was restored via backup grids at 5:00 PM. Our experts are currently looking into the causes of the accident,’ SverdlovEnergo reports.

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, September 22, 2015. The average amount of a retail loan issued to Sverdlovsk Region-based borrowers dropped by 10% (from 181,600 RUR to 164,600 RUR) between August 2014 and August 2015, National Bureau of Credit History reports. As for the country’s average, this figure grew by 4.13% (from 167,300 RUR to 174,400 RUR). ‘Retail lending crisis reached its peak in January-March 2015, when banks virtually stopped the lending assembly line; the average loan amount went up by 45,600 RUR, or 26.1% compared with January 2015 (128,900 RUR),’ the Bureau says. Director-General

UrBC, Pervouralsk, September 22, 2015. Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant/PNTZ (a member enterprise of ChTPZ Group) produced its 1,000,000th ton of small-diameter electric welded pipes. The set of 8.0mmX0.7mm pipes was delivered to one of Minsk’s leading household goods manufacturers, the Group’s press service reports. The plant’s pipe welding department makes small-diameter welded pipes in many shapes and sizes. This is Russia’s leading facility for making small-diameter shock absorber pipes and refrigerator pipes for Indesit, Stinol, Atlant, and BEKO. The plant has also had its refrigerator pipe