The Prime Minister of the Russian Federation Dmitry Medvedev today gave a long interview to the program ‘Vesti on Saturday’ with Sergei Brilev, in which he spoke about the state of the Russian economy, the May presidential decrees, the upcoming elections to the State Duma of Russia and the pension provisions for Russians.
The situation in the Russian economy is still difficult, but it is beginning to recover, Dmitry Medvedev said in the interview.
"Of course, I cannot say that we can all be satisfied with how the economy is working. The situation is complicated, it is not very stable yet. But still the economy is beginning to recover,’’ the Russian Prime Minister said, RIA Novosti reported.
Answering the question of whether the Cabinet is able to carry out the May decrees, taking into account the changes of recent years and the fall in energy prices, the Prime Minister assured: "Of course. I say this with confidence, because we are trying to do everything that is necessary, we are trying to work in these rather unpleasant economic conditions," Medvedev said.
"With regard to the presidential decrees of May 7th 2012, they are, certainly, the most important fundamental things for the country. It is necessary to perform them for the development of our country, for our people to feel better, and for the economy to show the correct results. it is not easy to do, but we try to do it and, if we talk about what happened over the years, and there were various things, in the end we have significant and, in my opinion, serious results,’’ the prime minister said.
As a result, he cited an increase in the average life expectancy of Russians to 71 years and an increase in the birthrate.
"This is an important result of our work on the decrees of the President, because they are directed towards improving public health, they address a number of specific tasks. Therefore, even in such difficult conditions, if we consolidate power, energy, and money, of course in certain areas it is possible to achieve quite tangible results,’’ Medvedev said.
The Russian Prime Minister noted that it gives the chance to return to the rules of pension indexation, which were in force earlier. This is an indexation of pensions in 2017 on the level of inflation in 2016.
"Moreover, this decision has been made, it is declared, and, naturally, we will stick to it," he said.
Speaking about Russian pensions, the Prime Minister expressed confidence that the authorities should not gloss over the truth, even if it does not cause positive emotions sometimes. The Prime Minister noted that the nominal pension increased almost 15-fold over the past 15 years.
