Foreign direct investment rises in Russia
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Monday, September 15, 2003
From the Associated Press

MOSCOW -- Foreign direct investment in Russia rose to $12.7 billion in the first half of the year, an increase of 50 percent from a year ago, Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov said Monday.

He said cumulative foreign investment in Russia reached $48.3 billion, adding that for a country the size of Russia, the amount "wasn't all that great."

Kasyanov said that the investment is not well distributed, with most of it concentrated in Russia's natural resources and in the central region of the country, the Interfax news agency reported.

He said the government was taking new steps, including pressing ahead with tax reform and efforts to protect intellectual property rights that he hoped would attract further investment.

Meanwhile, Kasyanov also noted that the gross domestic product rose 6.9 percent on the year in the first eight months of 2003. He repeated that he expects the GDP to rise 6 percent this year.

Russia's economy began to grow at the end of the 1990s after a long slide that followed the Soviet collapse of 1991. But economists have often warned that the country is too dependent on its natural resources and hasn't done enough to expand other sectors.

Also Monday, Kasyanov said that Russia continues to push ahead with its goal to enter the World Trade Organization, Interfax reported. "If the unusual, nonstandard and politicized requirements with relation to Russia are removed, Russia may become a member of the WTO very soon," Kasyanov said.

Russia first applied to join the WTO in 1993 but only started making major efforts to fulfill the conditions of membership when President Vladimir Putin came to power in 1999.

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