UPDATE: Mayor says Moscow to shift to “normal” economy in late 2021

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MOSCOW, Nov 11 (PRIME) -- Moscow’s economic situation will be more difficult in 2021 than in 2020, but it will reach “sizeable parameters” at the end of 2021, the city’s Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said at a forum on Wednesday.

“From my point of view, 2021 will be a difficult year, the beginning will be more difficult than 2020, but by the end of the year we will be able to reach sizeable parameters and a normal economy – the world, the country and the city,” he said.

The coronavirus factor will stop affecting the economy in May 2021, he added.

Sobyanin is sure that the economy will begin to recover fast after the pandemic wanes.

“In separate industries we have a huge slide, from 10% to 60%. But in general, the economy is balancing. It creates a ground for fast recovery after the situation improves,” he said.

In 2020, Moscow will implement the investment program in the volume similar to 2019 thanks to borrowed funds, he added.

The mayor also said that the city’s government will fulfil its social obligations 100% and possesses enough money for the purpose.

There will be difficult pandemic environment in Moscow in the next few weeks, and in two or three weeks, the government will make next decisions regarding the situation, he added.

First Deputy Prime Minister Andrei Belousov said that the pandemic is to finish for the Russian economy in 2020 or in 2021.

Belousov also said that Russia’s budget will spend 2 trillion rubles in 2021 to cope with the consequences of the coronavirus pandemic.

(76.3978 rubles – U.S. $1)

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