On 15 September, the round table discussion “Industry: the Difficulties of the Transition from Stagnation to Development” took place in the VIP-hall of the Benefit plaza congress hotel. Among the experts of the conference were the Rector of Voronezh State University, Dmitry Endovitsky, the Head of the Voronezh Region Department of Industry, Ivan Shkumatov, the Head of Voronezh Region Cluster Development Centre, Alexey Sukhochev, and the Vice-rector of Voronezh Base University, Igor Drozdov.
The participants of the event included the Chairman of Voronezhselmash’s Board of Directors, the Chairman of the committee on industry of the Voronezh Regional Duma, Grigory Chuiko, the Vice-president of Chamber of Commerce and Industry of the Voronezh region, Nikolay Tschipelev, the Head of the Perforator Union, Alexander Sukharev, the Director for Production of OOO Next Trade, Sergey Davydov, the Commercial Director of AO VFSD Micron, Alexander Gryazev, the Director General of NPO Dva+K, Alexander Duda, and a representative of OAO Corporation NPO “RIF”, Elena Kopylova. The event was organised by “Buznes-zhurnal. Tchernozemie”.
The event started with a speech by Ivan Shkumatov, the Head of the Voronezh Region Department of Industry. He said that the industrial output has increased in the recent eight years. Today, Voronezh takes 14th place among 85 regions of the Russian Federation for the industrial output. The industries of our region have achieved a strong position in the market – starting with the production of rocket engines and mechanical presses and finishing with the production of toys and other goods. Today, the major objective for manufacturers is to introduce their innovative products into the export market.
Then the organisers of the event suggested that the participants should discuss the activities of such organisations as clusters and technoparks which had been created to enhance the development of the regional industries.
The Chairman of the committee on industry of the Voronezh Regional Duma, Grigory Chuiko, explained that today there are nine major clusters in Russia:
“Pskov Electrotechnical Cluster is recognized as the best in Russia. This year, the government allocated 1.8 billion roubles to support industrial clusters. If an industrial enterprise belongs to a cluster it can get up to 50% compensation for its expenses on equipment purchase and other costs. That is why it is important to let the audience know about such opportunities.”
The participants of the meeting also discussed the issues of cooperation between education, research, and production and tried to understand if universities’ research background meets the requirements of production today and where manufacturers should look for qualified specialists. Those were the most discussed issues at the meeting.
The Rector of VSU, Dmitry Endovitsky, told the audience about the university’s experience of cooperation with leading companies of the Black Earth region:
“The Voronezh region is among those few regions which specialists from the Higher School of Economics call transitory. We can see a high demand for high-quality education in our country. That is why we have to use the best practices of the higher education institutions and industries as role models. For example, Efko was interested in chemical technologists. With the help of innovations and technological solutions which were developed by our university we were able to implement a challenging project. Today, VSU hosts Efko’s fundamental department and the company invests a lot of money into its development and infrastructure. We can make great progress if we unite the efforts of the university and the business community.”
