On May 23, during a meeting with Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, representatives of the agencies and companies involved in the state program for the development of the Arctic will get a chance to defend the projects that have fallen under the reduction. According to preliminary information, the Arctic development budget is cut four times. From the state program, an item on the construction of the nuclear-powered icebreaker "Leader" was struck out, which the St. Petersburg and Severodvinsk shipyards had to build by 2023. The question of large-tonnage LNG tankers passing through the Northern Sea Route (to Europe, to the Far East, to the countries of the Asia-Pacific region) will remain unresolved - but the savings on the icebreaker will give the budget about 80 billion rubles.

Earlier, the construction of the Arctic flagship was reported as a large-scale event, linking it with "the final consolidation of Russia's leadership in the region." According to preliminary data, the icebreaker's capacity should be 120 megawatts, length - over 200 meters, width - about 50. The ship's draft is 13 meters, which means that he could break ice more than 4 meters thick. "The ship will be able to provide navigation of vessels with a deadweight of about 100 thousand tons and a hull width of 44-50 meters from the cape Zhelaniya to the Bering Strait at a speed of 10 knots," was announced by the leadership of FSUE Atomflot in February. Apparently, now ambitions will need to be pushed aside - in favor of the budget.

The Ministry of Internal Affairs will have to accept that a number of projects related to security will be frozen; Environmental and scientific projects of the Ministry of Natural Resources will also be postponed indefinitely (in particular, the development of a genetic bank for samples of Arctic birch). The project of building infrastructure for the lifting of sunken nuclear facilities from the seabed will not be implemented either. It is possible, however, that a number of projects will be financed by other FTPs or from extrabudgetary funds. True, the icebreaker "Leader" is, according to sources, not relevant.

The projects related to the oil and gas industry turned out to be in question. First of all, the development of the ports of Sabetta and Dixon, the Arkhangelsk deep-water port, the Belkomur project - the railway line, which would connect Arkhangelsk, Syktyvkar and Solikamsk, providing transportation of gas condensate, oil cargo, etc. What exactly from this list fell under the reduction, . Perhaps the oil industry will be asked to take projects, if not completely on their shoulders, then at least for co-financing. It's not a fact that they will agree: they already bear serious expenses for development of deposits ...

With the initiative to reduce the budget support of the state program for the development of the Arctic fourfold (from 2010 to 51 billion rubles), the Ministry of Economic Development has acted with the government's request. According to the media, the proposal was previously discussed in mid-April at a meeting with the Prime Minister. The Ministry of Finance (the only one of the specialized agencies) has not previously agreed on the draft state program, passing a number of comments to the government on reducing costs. At the moment, the reduction of funding is preliminary; Finally, the issue of "freezing" of Arctic projects can be resolved at the end of May.