Resolution

On discussing urgent problems and tasks connected with development of transport sphere of North-Western federal district and the Russian Federation in general, participants of the conference note the following:

Development of the Russian economy has reached a stage when transport branch must turn from the stage of supporting and modernization of the branch to its complex development on the basis of an innovation and technological break-through.

In connection with this, current Transport strategy of the Russian Federation has been corrected. Its deadline has been broadened till 2030, federal laws are being passed.

Political party “United Russia” plays a leading part in working out and passing of laws that are so important for development of the branch.

In particular, development of port infrastructure, drawing of investment into this sphere and realization of innovation model of development of the branch will be helped by federal laws “About sea ports in the Russian Federation” and “About making corrections in the Federal law “About special economic areas of the Russian Federation”, which came into effect in the end of 2007.

Federal law № 315, passed on December 1, 2007, will become one of the most efficient measures for solving the task of reducing of executive power redundant functions. Administrative regulating mechanisms will be substituted by financial guarantees and insurance, compulsory certification – by declaring, and permissive system of the beginning of running a business – by an informing one. The number of checks in business will be reduced.

This will lead to administrative barriers reducing in the branch by striking a destructive blow on corruption.

Without that it’s impossible to solve the task of transition of the country’s economy to the innovation way of development.

Consolidation of legislative and legal base is demanded by institute of state and private partnership. Common limits for one of the forms of such partnership were determined in the law “About concession agreements”, passed in 2005. However, the law didn’t determine unconditional concessionaire’s property right to the property created by him as a result of the agreement’s fulfillment. In the end of 2007 such imperfections were eliminated.

Federal and local governing bodies continue active work of the Gulf of Finland port complex development, which helps to increase turnover of goods of sea ports and reorientate sea terminals of the region to nonpolluting cargoes.

At the same time, imperfection of the system of clearance of cargoes at check-points, insufficient development of infrastructure and adjoining modes of transport lead to unfounded idle time of vessels, delay of cargoes in ports and, as a result, impossibility to provide considerable growth of turnover of cargoes via ports of the North-Western region of the Russian Federation, which would meet demands of development of Russian economy.

Participants of the conference draw attention of bodies of legislative and executive power of federal and regional levels to drawbacks hindering rise of general effectiveness of work of all transport organizations participating in the transportation process, increase of competitiveness of Russian ports and Russian transport system in general. In connection with the aforementioned, participants of the conference consider it expedient to fulfill the following actions:

1. With the purpose of providing a common approach to development of port regions of the country thanks to applying of the model that is being worked out on the basis of transport complex of the North-Western region, with interregional coordinating centre in St.Petersburg, a work-group for transformation of the Party project into a State Programme ought to be created.

2. In order to form legislative base for sea and relevant transport as well as up-to-date infrastructure the following is suggested to be done during autumn session 2008 – spring session 2009 of the State Duma of the Russian Federation:

2.1. In order to speed up foundation of the state-private partnership mechanism in the field of realization of complex investment projects of transport infrastructure development both of federal and regional significance, and to form conditions for private investments attraction into transport infrastructure development:
An amendment to the law concerning port special economic zones (PSEZ) performance including decrease of the limit for minimal investments from ?100 millions to ?10 millions for PSEZ residents should be passed in the first reading.

2.2. In an effort to simplify a procedure of cargo registration at crossing points, and for cutting time spent on custom control:
A law on amendments to the Customs code of the Russian Federation in the part concerning obligatory advance warning of custom authorities should be passed.

3. Further to actions oriented at capacity increase of the port complex of the Gulf of Finland:

3.1. To speed up the process of issue and coordination with federal and regional executive bodies of the proposals concerning development of new cargo districts of the Large Port of St. Petersburg (Lomonosov) in terms of environmental and historical-cultural restrictions.

3.2. In order to raise trucking activities quality in the region subject to the standards of safety and ecology to ask Project Coordinator A.N. Chilingarov for the following:

3.2.1. To apply to the Governor of the Leningrad region for examination the possibility of the mutual coordination of two interconnected projects: project of transport-service complexes construction along the motorways/highways developed by the region government and “Transport service export development” project for foundation of up-to-date motor enterprises, suggested by the workgroup of the project “St. Petersburg – the Sea Capital of Russia” and approved by the project advisory committee.

3.2.2. To petition Ministry of Transport and Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia for experiment prolongation of a convoy car explotation without a car of Road Patrol Service of the State Automobile Inspectorate during bulky cargo transportation and for inclusion into current regulatory legal acts necessary alterations in follow up the results of the experiment in the this sphere.

4. In order to reorganize governmental control methods of the transport branch, to low administrative barriers in this industry, to take into consideration business community opinion while forming federal laws and standard acts, a workgroup should be formed to study possibilities for handover governmental bodies’ redundant functions to forming self-regulating organizations in transport sphere, including sea and river vessels bunkering, railway transportations, containerized, bulky and heavy-weight cargo trucking, forwarding cargo arrangement for bulky and heavy cargo trucking.

In this connection to apply to Project Coordinator A.N. Chilingarov for working out requests to the relevant ministries and departments for including their representatives into the workgroup.