Andrei Vorobyov said that 817 billion rubles and about $1 billion of foreign funds had been invested in the fixed capital of regional companies in 2018. Economic zones and industrial parks have been established with all the needed infrastructure. Medium-sized agricultural companies, in particular in the dairy and cheese sectors, receive subsidies for infrastructure development. This is why investments have increased by some 15 percent. More new jobs will be created in 2019, the Governor said.
Mr Vorobyov said he had received letters addressed to the President from the companies Daimler and Mercedes. The German businesses have quickly built a passenger car plant in an industrial park in the Solnechnogorsk District and plan to open it in April. It is the first Mercedes plant not only in Russia but also in Eastern Europe. The plant will roll out some 40,000 cars of four models annually. Mercedes is working closely with the colleges that will train personnel for the plant.
When the President mentioned an attractive idea of education centres, Andrei Vorobyov told him about the plans to establish two education centres for pupils from the Moscow Region and other parts of Russia, which would be modelled after the Sirius educational centre in Sochi. The first project provides for the expansion of the PhysTech School of the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology in Dolgoprudny, with the number of students growing from 600 to 1,500. The second project has to do with the popular Primakov humanities school. Both projects are in the advanced stage of preparations.
The Governor also updated the President on the opening of a bridge across the Volga River in Dubna, where the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research is located, in late 2018. The bridge leads to the Dubna Free Economic Zone, which has been expanded by 35 hectares because investors bring their money and jobs are highly paid there.
Other issues discussed at the meeting include the plans to build a general children’s hospital and the construction of an oncological block as part of the Healthcare national project, which will promote preventive examination and diagnosis at the early stages of the disease.