Instruments should be created to help Russian companies win in state tenders - Putin

Additional instruments should be created to help Russian companies win in tenders of state-run companies and state purchases, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at a congress of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs in the Russian capital on Thursday.
“Some additional instruments should be considered that would help our domestic companies to win tenders and contests in state purchases and purchases of our state-run companies,” the president said.
Meanwhile, he noted that these instruments should be attuned to avoid damage to consumers.
Putin recalled that today there was already a mechanism according to which Russian companies had preferences in such tenders at which they may be named winners even if their tender price is 15 percent higher than that of foreign rivals.
“I would increase it (this percentage - Itar-Tass eds) even more, but liberal economists oppose this. They contemplate whether quality will not be affected in the spheres of competition?” the president said. “We should think not only about producers, but also consumers,” he said.
According to him, it is also needed to ponder localisation of productions of foreign companies in Russia.
The president said that business people should realise their responsibility. “Russian companies should be registered on the territory of our country and should have a transparent property structure,” he noted.
Therefore, Putin stated that he had set a task to rid domestic economy of a too large number of offshore companies. “Required amendments in legislative base are being drafted,” he noted.
Meanwhile, the president added that these measures did not just seek “to restrict use of offshore schemes.” “Bans can hardly settle anything in this issue,” Putin said, noting that there was another guideline of making Russian jurisdiction more attractive, improving business climate, building up legal guarantees of property protection, improving court legal system, including arbitration court system. “We will tackle all these issues step by step,” Putin pledged.
He was confident that if domestic companies began to pay taxes in Russia, trust to business and private property institute, values of economic and business freedom would be built up. “This is a vital issue for Russia’s sustainable development,” the president added.
He pledged that domestic companies would be given necessary support, including aid for them to enter global markets.
“We proceed from the assumption that competitiveness of domestic business is a pledge of national competitiveness in general,” Putin noted.