When speaking at the meeting on developing the shipbuilding industry held by Russian President Vladimir Putin, Denis Manturov, Deputy Prime Minister – Minister of Industry and Trade, said that civilian shipbuilding has been regaining the positions it lost in the post-Soviet era and has been learning to build new kinds of ships. According to meeting transcript available on the official website of the Kremlin, Denis Manturov said that capacity utilisation within the shipbuilding sector is quite high.
According to the official, some 300 ships and units of maritime equipment are currently at various stages of construction at 63 shipbuilding companies. “There are also more than 700 ships of various kinds that state and private customers will need until 2035 according to a survey carried out by the Ministry of Industry and Trade, but not all of them have determined their technical parameters or funding sources, which means that they have yet to become firm orders,” emphasized Denis Manturov.
“We are proactive in expanding our icebreaker fleet, which is a top priority for us. We already commissioned two 60-megawatt icebreakers and will complete another one this year and two more after 2024. Rosatom has confirmed that we will need to build two additional serial nuclear icebreakers by 2030, as well as nuclear maintenance ships and four icebreakers running on organic fuel,” said Deputy Prime Minister adding that construction of cruise motor ships PKS-180 and PV300, and upgrade the Kometa, Meteor and Valdai hydrofoils has begun. According to the speaker, this line was supplemented by electric twin-hull boats with Ecocruiser and Ecobus models, which are in high demand. We launched the serial production of cargo vessels for river-sea navigation and entered the segment of high-tonnage cargo ships, built at the Zvezda shipyard in the Far East, which you have mentioned. This shipyard has already completed the first Aframax-class tankers and is building LNG tankers and product carrier ships for the Northern Sea Route.
The Government has instructed the interested agencies to clarify all the parameters taking into consideration cargo and passenger traffic projections. The primary purpose here is to get an estimate for the use of building cradles. The construction cycle for a ship is quite lengthy, so project costs tend to exceed the initial projections. Shipbuilding companies have faced this issue many times, especially when signing contracts with fixed prices while the project is not even ready. This way, in order to deliver the ship, they have to go beyond the initial budget and cover the difference from their own pocket.
“In this regard, we decided to conduct an audit of the accumulated debt with the Finance Ministry. We will start with USC enterprises, and based on the results, we will formulate proposals for their possible subsequent financial recovery,” said Denis Manturov.
“To rule out such situations in the future, I instructed the United Shipbuilding Corporation to avoid concluding any contracts without independent technical and economic expert examination. In the future, we expect to consolidate this principle at the legislative level for all enterprises in this industry, both in relation to state contracts and projects developed by companies co-owned by the state. Relevant amendments to the Federal Law On Industrial Policy have been submitted to the State Duma. They have already passed the first reading, and we expect them to be adopted at the beginning of the autumn session,” he added.
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