OREANDA-NEWS. April 05, 2012. The CCI of Russia Board Presidium has held a meeting at the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Russia.

The meeting focused on ways to build up the role of chambers of commerce and industry and business unions in trade and economic missions and presentation of the economic potential of regions (by example of the Moscow CCI, the Perm CCI and the Dmitrov Interregional CCI) and main results of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Russia in 2011.

The meeting of the CCI of Russia Board Presidium was held in the online conference format. Russian Union of Exhibitions and Fairs President Sergey Alexeyev (St. Petersburg), head of the CCI of Russia representative office in Germany Sergey Nikitin and Omsk CCI President Tatiana Khoroshavina attended the meeting online.

CCI of Russia President Sergey Katyrin opened and chaired the meeting. He gave the floor to CCI of Russia Vice-President Vladimir Strashko. The speech was dedicated to the CCI network’s potential of organization of business missions. Forecasts for the next eight years (until 2020) say that the world’s business tourism market will no less than triple to annual USD 1.6 trillion. Against the backdrop of these optimistic forecasts, the CCI potential of organizing business missions has not been used fully:  112 out of 174 territorial chambers organize business missions, alongside 72 regional and 40 municipal chambers. The South Urals CCI is the leading organizer of business missions. The runners up are the Tomsk, Moscow, Sochi, Volgograd, St. Petersburg, Perm and some other chambers.

Judging by CCI of Russia polls, 40% of missions are sent to CIS member states, 37% to Europe and 17% to Asia. The main priority of business missions is exhibitions; seminars and conferences rank second, and congresses go last, which means this activity is underdeveloped in Russia. The CCI system should promote it actively, Vladimir Strashko said.

Moscow CCI President Leonid Govorov presented the Moscow experience of organization of business missions in his report. He proposed to apply a comprehensive approach to the development of business communications. According to Leonid Govorov, the number of applications for business missions grew considerably in the post-crisis period.

Dmitrov Interregional CCI President Valery Logachev shared the experience of external business missions. He described as a direct consequence of presentations and missions organized by the Dmitrov Interregional CCI abroad an enlargement of investments in regional infrastructural projects, among them the construction of a large railroad hub, a multi-functional Italian techno-park, a safari park, an agro-industrial park and an agro-holding.

Perm CCI President Marat Bimatov proposed measures to increase the CCI share on the business missions market.  He called for the soonest codification of CCI of Russia business mission services, the putting of a regional chamber head in charge of this activity at the CCI of Russia Board Presidium for the period of one year, the introduction of a unified card of an enterprise - trade and economic mission participant and the approval of a general schedule of trade and economic missions. In the opinion of Marat Bimatov, the development of business missions also requires interactive maps of Russia and foreign states, a memo and an algorithm of a trade and economic mission participant, a unified standard of business mission organization and the training of regional chamber personnel to organize business missions, in which the Euroinfocenter potential should be used more broadly. Trade and economic mission revenues shall amount to no less than 30% of total revenues of territorial chambers in the future, the Perm CCI head is convinced.

CCI of Russia Board Presidium member, Board Chairman of the Razvitiye Association of Small and Medium Business Promotion Agencies Viktor Yermakov confirmed the high potential of the Euroinfocenter network for quality training of business missions and offered regional chambers to provide business mission services on a contest basis.

Head of the CCI of Russia representative office in Germany Sergey Nikitin called for more thorough organization of business missions to foreign countries. He cited as positive examples the recent presentations of the Kursk, Chelyabinsk and Kaluga regions in Germany.

Deputy head of the Federal Agency for the Commonwealth of Independent States, Compatriots Living Abroad and International Humanitarian Cooperation Alexander Chesnokov expressed the readiness to hold presentations of investment potentials of business missions organized by the CCI of Russia at Russian science and culture centers operated by the Agency.

Omsk CCI President Tatiana Khoroshavina shared the regional experience of organization of business missions. Apart from organizing trade and economic missions, the chamber presents the regional economic potential at foreign embassies and in foreign capitals, as well as organizes collective exhibitions inside and outside of Russia. The interregional cooperation of chambers plays a substantial role in this activity, Tatiana Khoroshavina emphasized.

Business visits amount to a half of one billion tourist arrivals per year, and about USD 250 billion are spent on them on the average, head of the Federal Tourism Agency international cooperation department Valery Korovkin said. As a rule, a business tourist’s expenditures are five times larger than expenditures of a regular traveler. The development of this profitable, predictable and all-season market in Russia is so dynamic that some forecasts predict  Russia will be inferior by this indicator only to China and India in five years. Five million people visited Russia on business missions in 2011. In order to make these optimistic forecasts come true, it is necessary to understand right now that the business tourism market development is restricted only by the underdeveloped infrastructure and the deficiency of skilled personnel to work with foreign business tourists.

CCI of Russia Vice-President Alexander Rybakov made a report on the second item on the agenda, main results of the Chamber in 2011.

The meeting participants also settled a number of organizational issues.

It was proposed to adjust the meeting decision to the proposals and remarks.