Please, tell us about “Investment seasons” which took place in Tomsk – what was successful or not, what are the next steps?

Since I have started to work as a Tomsk city deputy mayor, we managed to do a lot. And maybe it was a right decision to start not from establishment of the representation in Moscow, but from organizing infrastructure here in Tomsk.

We created a special web-site madeintomsk.ru, which has been recently presented to Inter-sectoral production association (ISPA) of Tomsk city. I think that the website could be filled with information within a month. All the ISPA participants are huge enterprises. Currently, 5 companies are presented on the website, but already 15 applications for posting have been submitted. Here all the information about Tomsk is displayed – business, Special economic zone (SEZ), city information; culture life (restaurants, cafes, hotels) and universities overview. Petr Chubik, TPU Rector, said that he would provide all the information about his university. Moreover, on-line video from web-cameras placed around the city is available at the website. Commercial news will be also posted here. Now we are recruiting a team for development of the website, which is planned to be informative and business one.

Now about “Investment seasons” – during press conference in Tomsk Boris Titov, President of “Delovaya Rossiya”, non-governmental organization, highlighted that the current visit was the most effective among trips to regions.

The situation can be described in the following way: nothing was being done in terms of city economy, I mean huge projects. And the reason is simple – industrial enterprises lived their own life, the city – its own life. There were no points of contact, no confidence, no interaction – nothing similar to “business-authority” dialogue. The main task that we had to tackle in team was to regain the confidence. It’s the most difficult task. No previous authority of all post-Soviet history of Tomsk established something that can be called “business-authority” dialogue. Every person in authority solved a particular problem; there was no complex system for it. In a period of less than one year we had to regain confidence, to form the administration stance and to announce it. We had to do it individually with each entrepreneur, to regain confidence discussing the legislation difficulties. Today I can state that the interest towards our work has increased dramatically on the part of business. As mayor deputies we visited a great number of Tomsk enterprises. A so-called “mayor calendar” appeared, which implies visiting two enterprises per month. A topic for meetings is finding common strategic and tactic tasks. Speaking about results, we can mention the idea, which appeared after Mayor’s meeting with Konstantin Notman. The idea purports the production of modern tramcar lines crossings and marvelous chiseled fencing and wrought lanterns for the city using foundry equipment of Sibelectromotor plant, although it has never been a main production of the plant. The next Mayor’s meeting had the same format – discussing enterprise strategy, finding ways for cooperation. In the framework of the meeting with Igor Itkin, President of STEK firm, LLC, we agreed to develop several projects. Tomsk Wi-fiization project is one of such directions. It’s important that no budget money will be involved. Investors will contribute money for the project implementation. First of all wi-fi points will be allocated in crowded places, on the central streets, in parks and recreation zones. The present project should be implemented very fast, I think we need 1−2 years to accomplish.

When can we expect to see the first results?

We only met and agreed two weeks ago. Several other meetings are planned. But gradually we are turning to the level of particular decisions. Right after the meeting the mayor issues a commission.

One more example is small-scale power generation. Today Kontur enterprise fulfills great volume of orders in small-scale power generation in other cities, and no order in Tomsk! The same situation can be observed within other Tomsk enterprises. Everybody works “outside”, and nobody – “inside”! Actually, municipality is not a customer, and it has never dealt with such orders. It happens for the first time. I visit 3−4 enterprises a week and study their strategies, than we put it into the Mayor’s schedule and than visit a particular enterprise with the Mayor, making particular proposals. I think we will have finished until the end of this year, and such work performed will have a great economical impact. I hope, it will also foster confidence.

In your opinion, what is the basis of such kind of confidence?

First of all, nobody from city administration has ever talked with business. Yes, today interbudgetary relations do not stimulate municipality to deal with industry development. But we realize that if we don’t do it, problems will double. We need to take care of it.

Confidence is reached through simple things. The first one is not to give ineffective promises. The second is to conduct open dialogue in the framework of “Investment seasons” and Mayor’s meetings with business. All the claims should be pronounced to Administration, it is taken into account, we search for proper solutions, and something can be solved at once, something – later. Economic sector has already understood that if the promise is given, this promise is fulfilled. Now we work in manual mode – in case a problem happened, we organize a consultation, particular tasks are charged. If it is necessary such tasks are charges on the Mayor’s part.

We are planning to hold “investment seasons” again in autumn. It will have an international format and will be completely devoted to foreign investors.

What concerns Tomsk development strategy, I’m absolutely sure that the city strategy is a social contract between all the economic entities and city dwellers. On September 1 Tomsk city strategy implementation starts. Until the end of the year a Strategy matching will take place in all the branches. And only after it, when a unified concept between universities, industry, small-scale and large-scale business, academic science, bureaucracy is formed, when everybody agrees and realizes that it is actually a right way, only at that time we will be able to state that the strategy is implemented. When we have a talk with investors and financial institutions, the first thing they demand is strategy and the points of top-priority development. Currently, we have nothing to show, an existing document is hardly operating. Today it is obvious that without modern Strategy with clear points of top-priority development nothing will happen in this sphere.

Currently, are there any clear points?

Definitely, such points are chalked out. Moreover, we start establishing development institutions in Tomsk. In August Tomsk development Agency, JSC will be registered. As we see it, it will be a single institution which could openly and honestly communicate with investors, finalize land parcels, prepare and establish new industrial grounds. Today we discussed it during negotiations with Inter-sectoral production association (ISPA) in Chamber of commerce and industry. First, colleagues opposed many things vigorously and then, when they grasped the idea, they started to say: “Ok, what kind of assistance is required?”

Let’s consider next top-priority project. Today we say that we need something, for which we can find neither federal nor budget money. It is transport infrastructure of the city. We should connect metropolitan area with transport in order people could easily reach their working places, for example, Seversl industrial park. We have chosen a high-speed tramcarcar.  

It means that decision on industrial park establishment in Seversk is adopted?

Yes. An intermunicipal working group has already been formed. I’m a head of it on behalf of Tomsk. I suppose we will start implementing first projects at the end of this year or at the beginning of next one.  

Our mission is to prepare infrastructure and to lay on transport system that people could reach their working places. A high-speed tramcar will allow spending only 8 minutes to reach Tomsk city center, being in Seversk city center. By the way, according to various calculations 20−30 thousand people commute from Seversk to Tomsk and back.

What is the budget for this project?

6 billion. Moreover, we have an investor. In September we will sign an agreement between municipalities and the investor. A road map of the project will be attached to the agreement.

Why is it interesting for investors?

Because it is purely marketing, and a holding of tramcar building plants is an investor. They cannot sell tramcars in other way. They should invest, establish a market. They took part in our first “Investment seasons”.

Let’s move further. We all realize that our main investor is students. Correspondently, taking into account current demographic setting, all the processes taking place around us – particularly, establishment of Siberian federal university, Novosibirsk development etc. we will only lose students in case we do nothing. Respectively, as soon as our universities are empty, the city will lose its historical perspective. That is way building a campus is a very significant project, which we see and discuss today. Very difficult half year long negotiations has finished, and we are suggested a completely different scheme – investor builds, universities rent. This is a long-term rent; it can be compared with tenement building. A project has a complicated nature and is held by Deloette&Touche. There is a full understanding from the sidelines of the city, region and Universities Consortium. Those who have this understanding will start, the other part will join them. Everybody realizes that in nearest 5 years there won’t be an item “capital development” in the budget. Correspondently, if there is no capital building within 5 years, we will lose positions on educational market. We do everything for the implementation of the campus project. Federal financing is not shut out. Boris Titov, “Delovaya Rossiya” President, claimed that the organization would encourage the idea of educational cluster establishment in Tomsk on the federal level and include it in the roar map of 25×25 project, which is approved by Vladimir Putin. Our task here is to create comfortable living conditions for Russian and foreign students. We should become an educational, science and research center. This is “INO tomsk 2020” project. Yesterday, “Delovay Rossiya” sent an application to Fedorov Institute, which is today involved in writing a Popular Front program. In this application they ask to include Tomsk in 16 top-priority projects. A road map of “Delovaya Rossiya” that includes 16 projects will be approved in September.

These are 3 projects, which are being performed by Tomsk development agency. And the fourth project is a project of Tomsk external positioning, which will be executed by the Agency. I will tell you just one figure. We asked Google and Yandex for the number of requests about Tomsk city – and the figure is very representative. For June 2010 it is 229 thousand clicks, for June 2011 it is already 1,5 million clicks! We are becoming more attractive for users. And one of the most important projects of Tomsk external positioning will be called “Tomsk 3.0”.

What is “3.0”?

The logic is simple. It’s the designation of an option. We consider that “Tomsk 1.0” is a historical town, “Tomsk 2.0” is an industrial town, “Tomsk 3.0” is a town that we want to see. It’s a cognitive town. This is a town entirely directed at obtaining knowledge. And the Incubator city is going to be one of large projects in Tomsk 3.0. This is an analogue of the Digital October art-space. We will try to launch this project in September.

The program of the project “Tomsk 3.0” includes an uninterrupted municipal business-game “Create the town with your hands”, a night library, public lections, an art-district, an exemplary street “24 hours”, a family alley, a flaneurs’ city, a recreation space 3.0, formation of urban environment as an educational one. Sergey Gradirovskiy will become a chief manager of the project.

Our development is fast. We have accomplished everything mentioned above literally for half-a-year. We want not only Deputy Governor, but also the whole Administration to joint it. We want all the districts to compete for 3.0. Here we integrate universities, youth and so on. It is a significant project. No city, which wants to win in competitive struggle, could exist without a project. We are making a competitive project for the whole city.

We regard an external positioning not as an advert; we will arrange events in Tomsk which will have a federal level. Actualness is not a point on a provisional switch but is a tempo. We need a large number of events. Today we want to conclude a contract with Digital October, so that we could interactively see what they are doing and show what we are doing. It would be a constantly operating teleconference bridge. We are just beginning to enter the external space.

In a couple of years after implementation of the project “Tomsk 3.0” we will not be able to recognize the city. It will become better. Today 3−5 cities in the country ideate the same way. And we need to be the first. Our budgetary poverty is our advantage. Those cities which receive a federal “golden rain” are potential outsiders as funds limitation is the best motivation.

The governor fully supports the project. The city administration will adjust for the tasks which will appear in the project. We need to be efficient and competitive!