Yakov Geller: “They didn't put the products on the shelf with the inscription ‘Buy Tatarstan products’ but gave the opportunity to sell”

The secret of three directories

The Republic of Tatarstan has again distinguished itself: the system of support for local producers has been created and launched for the first time in Russia. The decree on its creation was signed by President Rustam Minnikhanov on March 5, and on May 7, the site began work on the basis of the resources of the federal electronic trading platform zakazrf.ru.

“The need for such site is long overdue,” Farid Abdulganiev has recently presented the new resource. “In our region, where the economy of large business has traditionally developed, it is necessary to make additional efforts for the development of small and medium-sized businesses, to look for new tools and ways to stimulate them.”

The minister stressed that the main potential is now concentrated in districts — so to speak, in the places where it is difficult for a manufacturer to enter the market and it is difficult to find a manufacturer for a potential consumer. The Tatarstan production promotion system consists of the catalogue of local producers' offers, the catalogue of local customers' (buyers') needs and the catalogue of deals. This constantly updated information and analytical platform provides entrepreneurs with information about the needs of products within the region, and entrepreneurs can offer their products to consumers through it.

Used to be yours, now they're mine!

The minister of economy of the Republic of Tatarstan confirmed the importance of the new aggregator with statistics: in the first month of work alone, 56 enterprises from 23 municipal districts came to the site and presented 656 products that they are ready to supply, as well as 747 products that they need.

Farid Abdulganiev cited specific examples of the positive changes that followed after the opening of the new system. For example, he noted, if before its creation, apartment water meters were purchased outside Tatarstan, now they are bought from “their” producers in TP Betar-2 PLC, soft containers were also brought from other regions — now they are purchased in the Republic of Tatarstan from Milao PLC.

He also identified the target:

“In a year, it is necessary to identify and implement at least one investment niche in each district.”

If we rose beyond 700, then we will rise beyond 7,000 as well

Shortly having told about the presented system, Farid Abdulganiev left journalists, without waiting for questions, — he referred to urgent affairs. He left the opportunity to tell about the details to Yakov Geller.

Geller, answering journalists' questions, said that in the creation of new Internet platforms not a single ruble from the budget was invested, but he preferred not to mention the figures:

“Everything was done at the expense of internal investments of the state order agency.

He also noted that the major players such as Bakhetle and Ak Bars Development have already entered the site, they say, this is a certain indicator of its prospects, and that the number of names of products presented on it, which today exceeds 757, is planned to increase by 10 times by the end of the year.”

“This is the only republican platform that has become federal,” Yakov Geller noted with pride. “Guys, this is a new economy, we're trying to make it!.. We did not just put the products on the shelf with the inscription: “Buy Tatarstan products” but gave the opportunity to sell it.”

Not for twenty rupees

Yakov Geller stressed that the products of large Tatarstan enterprises are well known without any electronic platforms, and the new aggregator is needed primarily for small and medium-sized businesses, whose products and needs are little known. Not only businesses and entrepreneurs in the status of an individual entrepreneur but also self-employed, and even ordinary citizens can register in the system of promotion in the market.

It is profitable to buy through it, Geller says, because you can and should bargain. But with the sellers, there have already been incidents when they in the heat so reduced the price that they were forced to cancel the results of the bargaining so as not to go bankrupt.

“Now the site presents 128 works and services that self-employed can offer — which do not require a license,” said Yakov Geller.

The registration costs 10 rubles 20 kopeks, he said and stressed that the agency does not need the money itself — just by remitting them, the registering organization or another participant who does not have an EDS (electronic digital signature), gives the agency by a state order the opportunity to bind their username and password to their bank account:

“Initially we wanted to make the remittance symbolic — 1 ruble 20 kopeks, but the bank does not transfer less than 10 rubles, and it will cost us 50 rubles to return the money.”

From market promotion to market regulation

The officials who presented the electronic system of promotion of Tatarstan products carefully stressed that its implementation will contribute not only to the growth of production but also to the creation of new jobs. The correspondent of Realnoe Vremya saw in the creation of the new aggregator hints at the movement toward the planned economy, where it is customary to link the needs of certain products and tasks for its production.

But Geller, who during the briefing several times emphasized the inextricable connection of the project implemented by Tatarstan with the tasks on import substitution set at the all-Russian level, carefully used toned down sharp details, noting that “today specialists have a planned economy — the term is closed”:

“We in Russia produce a lot of products that have imported analogues, and, unfortunately, the purchase of imported analogues is not always based on the criteria of quality and price. What is happening is part of the overall transformation to a regulated market. The Gaidar formula with its ‘invisible hand of the market’ and the rules of Adam Smith's perfect competition do not suit us — we have a different society. I hate when they say: “But in America, but in Europe” — there is another life! Our people need to have a mission, plan and incentive to do it. And I support this idea of shifting to the regulation of market fragments.”

From product market to labour market

Both the minister of economy and the head of the republican agency for state order have repeatedly stressed during the briefing that the new system of promotion of products produced in Tatarstan should contribute to the growth of investment in production and the creation of new jobs in this production.

In a blitz interview that Yakov Geller gave to the correspondent of Realnoe Vremya at the end of the briefing, he elaborated on this topic and the problems that remain unresolved.

“Mr Geller, don't you have the impression that advanced, well-equipped productions, which were invested huge sums including budget appropriations and grants are quite separate from the huge mass of unbusy, unskilled, who is in search of labour?”

“In the Soviet Union, there was a lot of bad and a lot of good, good was this age segregation, when everyone knew that this young man should go to an institute, this — to college, and this — to vocational school. Common higher education now — not higher education, but purchased diplomas. The market of educational services, which allowed to buy diplomas, is not education. Today everyone wants to have a diploma to sit in a chair in the office.”

“Let’s suppose they sit. What's next?”

“We will be forced to return to this very segregation. Because people are different. My mother taught in a correctional school — these children were not made into lawyers and economists. Each plant had its own school, college and institute. But now we have the wrong market: education is not a market structure, but a state function. We need schools that train skilled workers and technical schools that they train qualified middle managers and institutions that train the scientific elite.”

“But we have no skilled workers, there are unemployed youth and unqualified workers from neighbouring countries in the production…”

“My point of view is that the education system should be restored, and not at the expense of budget money, but at the expense of the surplus value of interested consumers of this force. They should finance vocational schools. Schools should exist at the expense of social responsibility of businesses: a profit under a state contract — make a contribution.”