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President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Mr Tsivilev, it is a holiday today, but there are still some current if prosaic issues. To celebrate an anniversary like this to one’s heart content, it is necessary to do a good job, to produce results.

We have been discussing various issues related to the activities of Kuzbass and its future for almost half a day.

First, what do you think about the current situation and what do you consider most important for the near future?

Governor of the Kemerovo Region – Kuzbass Sergei Tsivilev: The main thing is that we formed a team. In accordance with your Executive Order on the celebration of the 300^th anniversary, we compiled a programme, and for a thousand days we worked towards this goal: on November 11, 2018, in Moscow, we tore off the first page of the 1,000-day calendar and today we removed the last page.

The result is very good, and the people of Kuzbass have done everything themselves – all they built or made; they designed, built and created themselves. Probably, the greatest achievement was that the team began working on this and people believed in it because they saw real changes for the better in their lives. Anyone who visits Kuzbass notices that it has changed.

We are already seeing positive results because investment is coming to us. As I reported to you, at the St Petersburg International Economic Forum alone we signed contracts worth 300 billion rubles in investment in non-coal industries. Investors in Kuzbass believe in its development. This is the biggest achievement.

Now we must continue to develop as a team up to 2024 under the region’s programme for socioeconomic development, which you approved and the Government signed. Now the team has many great opportunities.

This is a very good programme. We have built 14 new schools and renovated 28 schools under the My New School programme. This project – My New School – needs further support; it is about three times less expensive. We build new schools where new housing is being built, but we tend to forget about the old neighbourhoods. Overhauling the Yelykayevo secondary school, something we discussed today, cost 303 million rubles. It would have cost about 900 million if it had been built from the ground up.

The social effect of these schools is positive, because they improve the surroundings. This is a very good project, and we plan to expand it.

Public space, squares, boulevards and green spaces are in great demand, and are part of our socioeconomic development programme.

The sports complexes are very popular. We began to build a system, as you recommended, “from the courtyards out,” so we also build workout stations near blocks of flats so that every boy or girl could go out and play sports right in the courtyard. We also have indoor sports complexes and world-class sports complexes, which we saw as we drove by.

We are building these sports complexes now. In Belovo, we built and opened the country’s best sports complex for people with disabilities. We built an ice palace in Kemerovo and are now building Kuzbass-Arena. Major renovations are underway at the Metallurg sports complex, a football stadium and a rugby stadium in Novokuznetsk. We are building all this at our own expense.

Kuzbass-Arena is a gift to Kuzbass to mark the 300^th anniversary, and the resolution was signed during the organising committee’s first meeting. We also obtained the right to host the volleyball world championship, and the funds have been set aside for this as well. Therefore, Mr President, I would appreciate your support for Kuzbass-Arena for co-financing with the federal funds.

Vladimir Putin: Ok, we will look into that now.

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