OREANDA-NEWS. April 15, 2011. The establishment of a Direct Investment Fund in the Far Eastern Federal District and the Baikal Region was the main theme of the regional practical conference “Vnesheconombank: the Far East Development Projects”. The conference was held in the city of Khabarovsk on April 8, 2011.

The idea of establishing a Far Eastern and Baikal Region Direct Investment Fund was approved by Vnesheconombank’s Supervisory Board in December of 2010.

The main objective of establishing the Fund is to make investments designed to implement high-priority projects aimed at reconstructing, modernizing and building industrial, agricultural and infrastructure facilities on the territory of the Far Eastern Federal District and the Baikal Region.

The Fund’s structure is to be determined after making a list of top-priority investment projects in line with the Strategy for the Socio-Economic Development of the Far East and the Baikal Region up to the year 2025.

Management Board Member, Vnesheconombank Deputy Chairman Anatoly Ballo, Presidential Representative in the far Eastern Federal District Alexandr Levintal, Governor, Chairman of the Khabarovsk Territory Government Vyacheslav Shport gave welcoming addresses to the conference’s participants.

As part of the conference’s plenary session, there were presented promising investment projects of constituent entities of the Far Easter Federal District and the Baikal Region (the Khabarovsk Territory, the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), the Amur Region, the Jewish Autonomous Area, the Zabaikalye Territory, the Irkutsk Region, the Kamchatka Territory, the Magadan Region, the Primorsky Territory, the Republic of Buryatia, the Sakhalin Region, the Chukotka Autonomous District).

The conference’s practical sessions as part of Vnesheconombank’s educational project “Training of Specialists – Participants in Investment Projects Implemented with the Assistance of Development Institutions” were devoted to studying principles and criteria for selecting investment projects at Vnesheconombank, programs of supporting small and medium-sized enterprises, terms of financial and organizational support of PPP projects. Among the speakers at the conference were heads of Vnesheconombank’s key structural subdivisions and subsidiary banks, namely, the Russian Development Bank (OJSC) and Svyaz-Bank (OJSC).

All in al1, 150 people took part in the conference including representatives of executive authorities from the Far Eastern Federal District, the Baikal Region, top managers of the region’s profit-making organizations as well as representatives of major financial institutions and companies from China, Malaysia, Singapore, the U.S., South Korea, Japan, the World Bank and the International Finance Corporation.

By now, Vnesheconombank’s corporate governance bodies have made decisions to participate in funding 13 investment projects on the territory of the Far Eastern Federal District and the Baikal Region. The total value of these projects is 307.1 billion rubles with Vnesheconombank’s participation share being 199.1 billion rubles. The most important projects with Vnesheconombank’s participation include the construction of a new passenger terminal in the Vladivostok International Airport, the two projects to build timber processing production facilities in the city of Amursk and in the Vanino District of the Khabarovsk Territory, building auto  and automotive components manufacturing facilities in the Primorsky Territory, the reconstruction and modernization of the Khabarovsk refinery, building a heavy tonnage shipbuilding yard Zvezda-DSME.