OREANDA-NEWS. July 17, 2014. According to new research conducted by PwC, the overall economic impact of Universiade 2013 on the economy of Kazan amounted to RUB 10.8 billion.

Universiade 2013 is a sports mega-event which was held in July 2013. The competitions, in which 11,750 athletes from all around the world took part, ran for 13 days. Such events require significant resources for their preparation and staging and, thus, it is important to understand the benefits the host city receives.

The PwC report looks into the three types of impact that resulted from this event: the economic impact, additional economic benefits, and social and ecological benefits.

Economic impact comprises direct and indirect impacts from operational spending. Our research estimates the direct impact on the Kazan economy at RUB 6.2 billion, with the indirect impact coming to RUB 4.6 billion.

The direct economic impact includes revenues received by Kazan-based enterprises and entities from activities associated with providing services to non-resident guests and the Universiade Organizing Committee. The Organizing Committee's expenses were incurred from 2009 to 2013, and this was taken into account when discounting spending against 2013 prices using the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for Russia.

As for the indirect economic impact, this includes the additional revenue for those enterprises and entities which sell goods and services to enterprises and entities which already are the direct suppliers to the Universiade. The largest indirect impact was felt by the electricity, gas and water utilities sectors. This particular indirect impact comes to RUB 763 million. The impact on the remaining sectors of the Kazan economy stands at RUB 3.804 billion.

In addition to the economic impact, Kazan has seen additional benefits. They cannot be attributed exclusively to the hosting of the Universiade. They have more far-reaching and longer term implications for the city. For example, they include construction of modern sports venues and upgrading transportation infrastructure.

Additional benefits also include: increasing the city's appeal for tourists and businesses and, consequently, the creation of new jobs and boosting of GRP, which is in line with the Kazan development strategy adopted in 2003, as well as extensive media coverage of the Universiade.

PwC further analysed the additional benefits that are not associated with the city's economy, but nonetheless bring certain value for the city's residents and its environment. These social and environmental benefits from hosting the Universiade include:

Promoting sports among the public in line with the Russian government programme "Development of Physical Culture and Sports". According to this programme, the share of Russian citizens regularly engaging sports is expected to increase to 40% by 2020.

Providing modern sports infrastructure to the public which is also directly related to the implementation of the government programme "Development of Physical Culture and Sports". One of the programme's aims is improving the availability of sports venues for the public by up to 48% by 2020.

Cultural exchange with the Universiade's foreign guests.

A very important part of preparations for the Universiade includes activities aimed at improving environmental protection in Kazan. The research specifically points to the activities such as implementing environmental protection measures to improve the ecological situation in the city (for example, bank protection works on Sredniy Kaban Lake and Kazanka River, the construction of the Vostochny municipal solid waste landfill, improvement of urban amenities and landscaping of park areas).