May 7, 2015. Governor of Kirov Region Nikita Belykh awarded Gennady Mamayev, Director-General of LEPSE (a member enterprise of Uralvagonzavod Corporation) and Chair of the Russian Union of Machine-Builders’ Kirov Region division with the Compassion & Charity decoration. According to the corporation’s press service, Mamayev was proposed as a candidate for the award by an NGO called Brothers in Arms. ‘They stated Gennady Mamayev has been involved in charity projects for many years now. As the head of the area’s major machine-building enterprise and Chair of the Russian Union of

May 7, 2015. Sverdlovsk Region division of Rospotrebnadzor (the state consumer rights watchdog) inspected 63,000 kg of dairy foods last year and found 15,000 kg unfit for sale. This was 2.5 times more than in 2013, the division’s deputy head Dmitri Kozlovskikh said at a press conference. ‘The increase in faulty items percentage mainly has to do with the fact that some 5,000 kg of foods with an incorrect date of manufacture stated on them (‘foods from the future’) were found at Manchazhskaya Dairy,’ he explained. 46% of faulty items had an incorrect manufacture date on them, 44% failed to meet

May 7, 2015. People in the medical profession and wholesale traders proved the most wanted jobs on Yekaterinburg labor market in the first quarter of 2015, E1.Rabota says. IT specialists and blue-collar workers are next on the list. The most difficult-to-get positions in Yekaterinburg are those in the top managerial tier, Human Resources sector, and office clerks.

May 7, 2015. Customer traffic went down by 15% to 20% in Yekaterinburg shopping malls, head of Ural-Hermes Alexander Zasukhin told UrBC. ‘The unfolding economic crisis touched upon the entire commercial estate market, including shopping malls. Our customer traffic decreased by 15% to 20%. Adding to the problem are the people’s shrinking incomes,’ he said. The rental rates have gone down by 10% compared with mid-2014, which is another negative trend. At the same time, the share of vacant shopping areas for rent still comes to the typical 3%.

May 7, 2015. Fitch Ratings changed Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) long-term Issuer Default Rating outlook from Negative to Stable and confirmed the rating at BB+. ‘The rating is reflexive of MMK’s strong position on the Russian market; the company sells a wide range of steel products with high value-added. The recent changes in the rating outlook indicate a considerable decrease in the company’s leverage last year,’ the agency explains. Fitch says MMK’s consolidated debt dropped by $0.6bn in 2014. Compared with 2011, this debt decreased by $1.8bn and is expected to keep going down

May 6, 2015. Uralvagonzavod Corporation’s head plant assessed the efficiency of its collective agreement in 2014. The agreement is valid through 2017 and was signed in accordance with the Russian legislation. The set of socioeconomic and other projects it lays out is targeted at meeting output figures, staff recruitment and retention, and enhancing labor productivity, the corporation’s press service reports. The company directed 12.2bn RUR to workers’ wages, with the average monthly pay coming to 32,842 RUR, which exceeds the figures for a year earlier (30,254 RUR) by 8.6%. Besides, this

May 6, 2015. Uralvagonzavod Corporation’s head plant in Nizhniy Tagil saved 197m RUR last year due to the introduction of new equipment, the corporation’s press service reports. ‘The plant kept implementing its technical upgrades program last year in order to build up on its competitive advantages. 577 new machines with the total cost of 2.9bn RUR were installed at the plant,’ the press service says.

May 6, 2015. Sverdlovsk Region’s number of the unemployed exceeds that of available jobs by 3,000. In early April, the number was 1,600. Sverdlovsk Region Labor & Employment Department’s website states the number of vacancies advertised by employers came to 29,774 on April 30, while the number of the unemployed came to 32,869. The official unemployment rate stood at 1.44%. In Yekaterinburg, there are currently 16,768 job opening, while the number of the unemployed comes to 5,512. The official unemployment rate comes to 0.76%. In Nizhniy Tagil, there are 1,464 job openings and 1,962 people

May 6, 2015. The prices of goods and services in Sverdlovsk Region went up by 0.4% in April 2015 and by 8.5% compared with the start of the year, Sverdlovskstat reports. Food items grew 0.1% and 12.5% more expensive, respectively, while alcohol drinks grew 1.5% and 6.4% costlier, respectively. The prices of non-food items rose by 0.9% in April 2015 and by 8.2% compared with the beginning of the year, while those of services remained the same in April as in the previous month yet rose by 4.6% compared with the beginning of 2015.

May 6, 2015. As of May 1, 2015, Ural Federal District-based businesses and private individuals owed their creditors 81.01bn RUR, which was 20.77% more than at the start of the year, Sequoia Credit Consolidation reports. According to the company’s research findings, there is an average of 164,197 RUR worth of loan debts per capita in Sverdlovsk Region. Despite the facts that loans get issued on a much smaller scale at the moment, the amount of loan debt went up considerably, that is, by 17% compared with the start of 2015 by 50% compared with a year ago, and by 78% compared with the beginning

May 5, 2015. Students from five Yekaterinburg schools went on a guided tour of Plant 9 (a member enterprise of Uralvagonzavod Corporation) as part of their job counseling program, the corporation’s press service reports. The young visitors went to the company military vehicles exhibition and had a chance to go inside actual production departments. They were impressed with the newest machines at Department 23; these came to replace the older versions under the company’s upgrades program. The students could ask workers about their pay and about the peculiarities of working at a defense

May 5, 2015. On April 30, Ural Airlines celebrated the 20th anniversary of the day its Yekaterinburg-Prague flight was launched, the air carrier’s press service reports. The company operated its first chartered flight from Yekaterinburg to the Czech Republic’s capital two decades ago. Five years later, a scheduled flight was launched, with over 150 people on board the first time the flight was operated. Ural Airlines have serviced over 300,000 passengers on this flight over the last twenty years. ‘Ural Airlines grew to become Václav Havel Airport Prague’s respected partner and is now partners

May 5, 2015. MegaFon and Ural Forest Surveillance Air Base keep working together on monitoring forest fires in Sverdlovsk Region online. This year, 56 surveillance cameras with 20-km coverage will be fitted with MegaFon’s software and hardware, the telecommunications provider’s press service reports. MegaFon’s technologies, its expansive network, and equipment will help the air base experts keep track the situation in the local forests online, identify forest fires at their earliest stages, and react promptly. ’45 fires were prevented with the help of the video surveillance system in

May 5, 2015. Sverdlovsk Region’s retail trade turnover decreased by 8.5% (in comparable prices) in January-March 2015 compared with January-March 2014 and came to 240.6bn RUR, Sverdlovskstat reports. The average monthly sales of commodity goods came to 18,536 RUR per capita. Trading firms and sole traders operating outside farmers’ markets were responsible for 96.2% of retail sales, while the share of goods sold at retail markets and fairs came to 3.8%. The share of foods (including drinks) and tobacco rose by 2% against the first quarter of 2014 and came to 48.7%. The volume of food and

May 5, 2015. The Bank of Russia decreased its refinancing rate by 1.5%, that is, down to 12.5%, the bank’s official website states. The bank decided to raise the rate by as many as 6.5% at once, up to 17%, in December 2014. This had to do with the need ‘to limit the dramatically increased devaluation and inflation risks’. In January 2015, the rate was reduced by 2%, from 17% down to 15%. In March, the CBR Board of Directors decided to reduce the rate by another 1%, down to 14%.

April 30, 2015. A special firefighting vehicle produced by Omsk Transport Machine-Building Plant (a member enterprise of Uralvagonzavod Corporation) will now be used by the Russian Armed Forces; a decree to this extent was signed by First Deputy Defense Minister Valeriy Gerasimov in early April, the corporation’s press service reports. ‘The machine was designed by our Omsk-based experts in 2012; this is one of those rare cases when it only takes a year to design, test, and produce the vehicle. In 2013, the machine was presented at Russian Arms Expo in Nizhniy Tagil and aroused great interest

April 30, 2015. Students on ChTPZ Group’s The Future of White Metallurgy Training Program came to Moscow upon the invitation of People’s Artist of the Russian Federation Konstantin Raikin, the Group’s press service reports. The trip to Moscow was made possible due to a special cultural exchange program initiated by the company shareholders Andrei Komarov and Alexander Fedorov and due to personal support of Konstantin Raikin, People’s Artist of the Russian Federation, Professor, Artistic Administrator of the Higher School of Stage Arts. The idea is to offer a chance for all-round education of

April 30, 2015. Bank Koltso Urala’s experts modeled a portrait of a ‘typical customer’ opening a bank account with them. Such a customer is likely to be a woman between 45 and 55 years of age who lives in a large city or the primary town in a particular district and keeps slightly over 300,000 RUR in the bank, Koltso Urala’s press service reports. ‘The data we have been collecting over the last year or so indicate women remain the most proactive private customers: over 70% of all the bank deposits get opened by female clients. Nevertheless, male customers place larger sums with the bank:

April 30, 2015. MegaFon is launching a special offer on its international roaming services. Calls to destinations from among the most popular ones in Yekaterinburg’s Koltsovo Airport’s timetable are now up to 68% cheaper than the market’s average, the telecommunications provider’s press service says. According to Koltsovo Airport’s data, Egypt, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, and India are going to be the most popular places to travel to this summer. As for Europe, holiday-makers will head mostly for Greece, Cyprus, Bulgaria, Finland, Italy, Spain, and Montenegro. MegaFon’s base rates for

April 30, 2015. 14,000 employees of Sverdlovsk Region-based enterprises had to switch to working part-time; another 5,000 workers are now on unpaid leaves, Chair of Sverdlovsk Region Trade Union Federation Andrei Vetluzhskikh said at a press conference. ‘They could all lose their jobs in the nearest future. There are currently 32,700 people registered with Sverdlovsk Region unemployment agencies, and another 19,000 could join them soon,’ he said. According to Vetluzhskikh, things have grown much worse lately: a year ago, there were virtually no employees working part-time or on unpaid leaves