By Vestnik Kavkaza
The ruble continues to grow slowly against the dollar and the euro, which began against the background of a slight increase in oil prices last week. Nevertheless, among experts a rather pessimistic mood dominates.
According to the Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Energy, Ivan Grachev, the sharp decline in the ruble was inevitable: "The main problem with the ruble is due to the fact that since 2000 our Ministry of Finance and the Central Bank engaged in strengthening the national currency, the ruble. The price was 20 rubles to the dollar then ... If we take 2000 as a reference point, today the ruble sooner or later would have been about 90 rubles to the dollar without the influx of petrodollars. However, according to Grachev, the dollar can easily hold in the current framework while maintaining the current level of oil prices.
Former finance minister, head of the Civil Initiatives Committee Alexei Kudrin, believes that the economy came unprepared for the new crisis, "It is weakened by poor structure, bad performance of the institutions that should ensure efficiency and competitiveness. The large share of the government in the economy significantly restricts it." Calling the economy "not fully reformed," Kudrin said that the most favorable time for reform was lost and now the Russian economy has to be reconstructed in an emergency mode. "This is a serious challenge for the whole economy – changes in the conditions for export-oriented industries to import, to have a market share of imported goods. Now all these rules are changing very quickly, in a shock version. Of course, this is a significant blow to business, to the stability of Russia's economy and the well-being of its citizens. We need to reform, the situation is favorable for this. Unfortunately, we didn't use this period before the crises moments," Kudrin said.
In the expert’s opinion, next year the real income of the population will decrease by from 2 to 5 percent for the first time since 2000, inflation will be from 12 to 15 percent next year.
The current situation poses the greatest risk to modernization and business development. "Imports will decline about 40 percent in the next year in Russia. Investment-related imports will be subject to greater risks – equipment, materials, construction materials for investment projects, for buildings, industrial facilities. The price now established in rubles for these services, equipment, products will be high for the economy of the projects that are initiated. That’s why today we have to expect that the decline in this import sector will be much larger. It will slow down the modernization of Russia. Access to modern technology and equipment, modernization will be more difficult for Russian enterprises. It will slow down the development of the Russian economy," Kudrin believes.
According to him, imports cannot be fully replaced by domestic production, due to the absence of analogues and modern technology on such a scale: "One country cannot create a whole range of technological capabilities." Kudrin believes that the role of the Russian economy in the world will be significantly reduced and next year Russia will go into "junk" rating.
