Russia’s Medvedev sees zero economic growth in 2016

MOSCOW, Apr 21 (PRIME) -- Russia’s economic growth will be close to zero in 2016, but is projected at 1–2% in 2017–2019, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said at a government meeting on Thursday.

“We are working on the economy, which is currently adapting to a new reality, to return to growth. In accordance with the basic forecast, growth of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) will remain in the zero or slightly negative zone this year, while in the 2017–2019 period a small increase of 1–2% is expected,” he said.

“Initial conditions for the Russian economy remain quite difficult; we are talking about sanctions and limited access to foreign capital and technologies, and other politically motivated actions. Quite an unstable situation on the hydrocarbon market, that’s why we have agreed that we will estimate all this, for obvious reasons it is difficult to make a forecast, but it is better to lower possible incomes when making a forecast than look for additional reserves to balance the budget later,” Medvedev said.

The basic forecast implies an Urals oil blend price of U.S. $40 per barrel, he said.

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