Petersburg Forum of Fantasies

How PMEF has ceased to be international and economic, and the business agenda changed dance with weapons and illusion of greatness

The St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (PMEF-2023), which ended on June 17, was not much like the main business event of the country, which it seemed several years ago. Not only Western journalists, but also Russian businessmen, who were completely excluded from public events, were superfluous on the forum. And since they could not attract active high -ranking guests even from friendly countries, dancing, Girinovsky’s neural network, Chinese cars from AvtoVAZ, between Putin’s stories about “Nazis in Ukraine” took place on the agenda. “Cold” tried to understand what the new PMEF is and what these changes say about the Russian economy (nothing good).

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For foreign journalists, the PMEF ended long before it began: on June 1, they received permission to participate, and on June 2, the Russian side annulled all the accreditation of journalists of unfinished countries. The ban without explanation was announced by Presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov.

After the completion of all the forum events, the version that they simply regretted them does not seem absurd. If journalists came to St. Petersburg, then in vain would spend their time and money. After all, practically nothing that would resemble the economic forum in the standard sense, did not happen on the site. Even a set of economic news from the event was secondary and more resembled the routine comments of officials on momentary issues, and everything else was more likely a summons of tabloids.

With all the deformations, PMEF has recently remained international and economic. In 2023, only memories remained of these words, and the supposedly great interest in the events on it looks like a fantasy supported by one person.

Merry carnival

It has long been customary to fill the void at the site of the semantic component in Russia with attractions and carnival. At first, Putin’s direct line degenerated into it, then a large press conference, and now, in 2023, the economic forum, which was hostage by the fantasy of its participants, also fell to their level. We must pay tribute to the guests from the UAE - they completely caught the spirit of the event and fit perfectly into it. On the first day of the PMEF, they danced with the canes, and in the second they added to the dance of the carbine, which became a great prologue to Putin’s emotional statement (on the “economic” forum) about the refusal to reduce the number of warheads.

The carnival was and from five muses of Russian exports, which the Russian Export Center (REC) sent to pose at the stand “Made in Russia”. Girls in kokoshniki and stylized outfits as thought should have inspired entrepreneurs for new achievements. True, against the background of the statement of Deputy Prime Minister Tatyana Golikova, a million deficiency of qualified workers, it seems that only inspiration will not be enough.

A neural network "Zhirinovsky", which was introduced by the LDPR, was responsible for the infernal carnival. The head of the late party founder thought for a long time, and then broadcast in a recognizable voice. True, for some answers of the creators, it was possible to attract under some article. For example, to the question of what to do with Ukraine, the neuropolitics urged to leave this country alone and take care of its citizens, and not spend resources on other people's problems.

The ideologist Alexander Dugin was responsible for metaphysics. At a meeting on the Horizon-2040 project (the goal is stated for the determination of the image of the future of Russia by 2040 based on global trends and forecasts), he stated that Russia "needed a deurbanization in Futuro-settlement, in such a Futuro-rods of an outer space, maybe in the form of airships."

Herman Gref suffered Fiasco in an attempt to start a prototype of the Lada premium car, which was also created for officials. Banker, known for his love for the spiritual leaders of the East, pressed the automatic ignition button several times, but Aura ignored his efforts. They fixed the car quickly, carefully looking under the hood. After that, the Minister of Finance Siluanov got behind the wheel, and Aura earned with him as expected.

The embarrassment happened with the other premiere of the leader of the domestic auto industry. The new Lada X-Cross 5 was not just exceptionally similar to the FAW Bestune T77-on the steering wheel, the original nameplate of the Chinese manufacturer was noticed, but also about twice as much as the Chinese counterpart. However, the AvtoVAZ representative intensively denied rumors about the copy and insisted that "the car was created in cooperation with one of our new eastern partners."

An even more intolerable to criticism was the representative of Astrakom, which introduced the Patriot K30t to the PMEF DROP. The chief credit of the Readovka wire resource Alexei Kostylev decided to ask why the drone is so similar to the Evo II Pro V3 and where it was produced, but instead of explanations, he ran into threats to his address.

But the regional authorities, on the contrary, were responsible for comments. For example, when the delegations of the Rostov region indicated that the Siberian Federal District (Siberian Federal District) was depicted on the stand in old outlines, the picture was promptly changed to the correct one. The Siberian Federal District himself was noted as the most patriotic performance: pumped up men, dressed as paratroopers, puffed the heating pad and broke it, and then broke the tennis ball with their bare hands. The reprisal against the usual objects took place under the song “I am Russian”, in which Shaman assures that it goes to the end. And with all the desire, it is difficult to find the best illustration of the image of the thoughts of the chief participant in the forum.

M - between the table

Before the war with Ukraine, status politicians and prominent businessmen came to the forum every year. So, in 2010, Petersburg was visited by French President Nicolas Sarkozy and the Minister of Economics of the country, the future head of the European Central Bank Christine Lagard, in 2017-Prime Minister of India Nare Ned Modi , in 2019-Chairman of the PRC Xi Jinping . In 2022, it was possible to lure only one international leader to the forum-the head of Kazakhstan Kasim-Zhomart Tokayev .

True, the latter summed up the presence of his own position - he refused to recognize the independence of the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, did not want to accept the Order of Alexander Nevsky from the hands of Putin, accused some Russian deputies and journalists of incorrect statements to Kazakhstan. The highlight of the demarche was that among these journalists was Tigran Keosayan - the husband of the head of the RT channel and the moderator of the discussion Margarita Simonyan.

This time the organizers decided not to risk it. In the plenary meeting, President Algeria Abdelmadzhid Tebbun participated with Putin, who announced the “new cold, non -processed economic war” against Russia and called Putin “a friend of all mankind” from a place. Having fulfilled the political minimum program, the Tebbun recalled that Algeria needs Russian grain, and the country also wants to in Brix and money. In between these “programmatic” statements, the politician calmly listened to the argument of his colleague about the “Nazis in Ukraine” and the successes of the Russian economy.

At the same time, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky in Kiev also met with the leaders of African states. And his circle of communication was much more representative: President of South Africa, Sirl Ramafos, President of Zamybia Hakaine Hithynem, President of the Comorian Union of Comor Islands Azali Azsumani (current head of the African Union), President of Senegal Maki Sall, Egyptian Prime Minister Mustafa Madbuli, as well as special representatives of the presidents of the Republic of the Congo and Uganda. All of them will later come to Moscow to discuss the peaceful settlement of the war. It is difficult to get rid of the thought that, wish these tall guests to attend the forum, the meeting with Zelensky could take place a little earlier. Indeed, for example, the leader of South Africa announced his visit to Kiev and Moscow back in mid -May, a month before the PMEF, although all the forum dates were known at the end of 2022. Nevertheless, while the head of friendly Russia of the state, a partner in BRICS, discussed a peaceful settlement with Zelensky in Kiev, Vladimir Putin told the forum that his unnamed Jewish friends consider the Ukrainian leader a “shame of the Jewish people”.

The President of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the country of the PMEF, Muhammad Ben Zaid Al Nahayan held negotiations with Putin, but officially evaded participation in PMEF. Therefore, the Prime Minister of Cuba Manuel Marrero Cruz, Prime Minister of Kyrgyzstan Akylbek Zheparov, Armenia President Vaagn Khachatryan and the self-proclaimed South Ossetia fell into the list of status guests. All of them, with the exception of the head of the unrecognized republic, are not leaders of states and were not seen in activity on the forum.

As for the foreign business, it was also not possible to find it on PMEF. Only Gazprom and Rosneft boasted about a meeting with the delegation of the Chinese National Oil and Gas Corporation (CNPC), headed by the chairman of the board of directors, Dai Hawlyan, but the top manager was not noted and did not comment on his arrival. Although he did not have real risks for sanctions or other restrictions for active participation on the forum. Nevertheless, the Kremlin and the state media in every possible way tried to issue the fact of the arrival of foreign guests to St. Petersburg as evidence of a wide foreign representative office at the PMEF.

Any forum is discussions, discussions in which different opinions encounter. In the case of the economy, these are the opinions of government members, influential businessmen, analysts, scientists. This is exactly what the World Economic Forum looks like in Davos or, for example, the Chinese Development Forum (CDF), where this year was the head of Apple Tim Cook, the director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Kristalin Georgiev , and the chapter of the German Allianz Oliver Bethe was the co-chair. Nothing of the kind on the current PMEF was observed. So, in the Business Dialog “Russia-China”, the Chinese side was represented by the ambassador Zhang Hanhway and the chairman of the Union of Chinese Entrepreneurs in Russia Zhou Lygun, people who did not even need to cross the border in order to come to Petersburg. On all at least some status discussions of the forum exclusively Russians were represented, there were no opinions of even friendly countries. The status of the International Forum becomes as ghostly as the hope of obtaining frozen reserves from the Western countries through stories about illegal sanctions.

There is no more economy

However, the disappearance of “M - International” and the transformation of PMEF into PEF ( the original name for the forum) is only half of the predictable disaster. Big questions appeared to the economic part. For example, the complete absence of entrepreneurs, for which such events are held in theory. Newsmakers in economic matters became exclusively officials, deputies and top managers of state-owned companies who discussed their own state affairs. These things turned out to be very good on the one hand-and GDP is unexpectedly quickly restored, and the inflation falls , and the import is growing , but on the other hand, over and over again, almost all the participants said that the money ended, and where it was resolutely incomprehensible from. The head of the Ministry of Economic Development, Maxim Reshetnikov, performed more frankly. He admitted that without cutting expenses and changing the budget rule, that is, more spending funds from the National Welfare Fund (FNB), one cannot do.

“We really talk about it a lot, but as soon as we approach serious decisions, it turns out: do not touch it, this is necessary, this is an order, and so on, and so on,” the minister explained. According to him, discussions are only on the question of how to cut expenses-tough on some articles or a wide front, then to add where the trouble is at all. At the same time, he said that in the government they had already referred a bunch of ineffective solutions, past projects do not pay off and gave rise to debts, and the new ones look very doubtful. “We have a gigantic dispute now, there is a construction of it and who will return it later,” Reshetnikov stated.

The head of the Ministry of Finance Anton Siluanov confirmed : there is no extra money, and if someone needs it, then someone will have to take it. All other methods will lead to an increase in inflation and business problems. From where to pick up, the minister did not specify, but hinted that it would be possible to cut out the budget articles that were not revised for 10 years-even during the pandemic Covid-19. What are these articles, Siluanov did not say, although he admitted that the decision looks the most difficult. The head of Sberbank German Gref was more categorical: the expenditure part of the budget will inevitably increase, and the expenses for social tasks, national security and the construction of infrastructure are inviolable. So, taxes will inevitably increase .

There was no one to ask what business representatives think about it. Unless the head of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (RSPP), Alexander Shokhin, denied the words of the First Deputy Prime Minister Andrei Belousov about the voluntariness of a one-time collection from business: the Russian authorities have been trying to collect additional tax from large companies since February, he must bring 300 billion rubles to the budget. According to him, the author of the idea was the Ministry of Finance, and companies were made to clearly understand that they should share profit.

The sensations of the forum include only the fiery support of Oleg Deripaska one of the statements of the head of the Central Bank Elvira Nabiullina, because the billionaire has long become the main public opponent of the regulator policy. The businessman's delight caused words about the need for privatization. In his opinion, it is necessary to sell state property immediately. "The privatization of everything now is the main slogan of our days!" -He wrote in his telegram channel.

Unless the head of the State Duma Committee on Budget and Taxes, Andrei Makarov, who once after the Aesopes, could not ignore the surrealism of the situation. For example, he explained the issues of criminal and administrative prosecution of the business by the example of the collection and harvesting of mushrooms, saying that for chants the size of the hat should be less than one and a half centimeters, and for loaders - less than two and a half centimeters, otherwise administrative or even criminal liability may occur.

“How not to plant if the fox diameter is less than one and a half centimeters? Obviously, you need to plant. <...> Someone is very funny. Why did he laugh when I said about administrative and criminal liability? Ah, he is a foreigner! He does not know that the quality of prisons in our country has not changed. Well, nothing, they laugh again, ”the deputy warned. Not only entrepreneurs and richest people of the country, but even influential officials, decided to avoid surreal discussions about mushrooms in 2023.

This year, PMEF did not notice the loss of Deputy Prime Minister, the curator of Russian energy Alexander Novak and Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin. And if Novak explained his absence with a disease, then the head of government simply disappeared during the supposedly main economic event in the country. Is it possible to consider the economic forum that is free or involuntarily completely ignored by the business, Prime Minister and curator of key export industries? Probably, yes, but only in reality, where the dollar will collapse soon, the breakthrough is inevitable, and Russia will soon become a leading technological power.

Petersburg Forum of Fantasies

Putin’s final performance, which has been submitted for many years as the culmination of the forum, turned out to be surprisingly organically a common mood. The head of state read a record for the duration, which seemed written under some other event, perhaps an extraordinary message to the Federal Assembly. The alleged foreign participants could hear how the president proposes to raise the minimum wage, save payments for families, resolve unemployment issues in a number of regions and consolidate the concept of partial employment. It was also not the most new theses that GDP is growing, inflation is falling, the poverty level is falling, the western hegemony ends, and Russia is open to foreign contacts and wants to trade in national vats.

It was precisely those who spoke the most on PMEF-officials and top managers of state corporations that were most suitable for the role of the target audience of the performance. After the speech, it was no longer a surprise that Putin began the plenary session with a conversation about Ukraine and the Nazis, and then asked to show the prepared video about the atrocities of the Second World War. The most striking quote of “discussion” was the Putin’s “horseradish” , said in an imaginary discussion with NATO regarding the reduction of nuclear weapons.

The agenda of Putin did not correlate with the problems at all that his economists discussed at the forum. Where the government and the Central Bank see the loss of half of oil and gas revenues and the need to look for ways to compensate for the failure, the president speaks of successes in getting rid of oil and gas dependence. Где чиновники признают необходимость резать расходы, нехватку работников и невозможность бесконечно доить бизнес, Путин обещает новые социальные выплаты и резкое увеличение МРОТ.

Что до общения с бизнесменами, то эта практика, похоже, ушла в прошлое. Встречи с ними у Путина не было второй год подряд. В Кремле ситуацию не комментируют, и только Шохин из РСПП объяснил ее отсутствием представителей иностранных компаний, желающих засветиться на встрече с российским лидером в рамках форума.

Eloquent silence

Делать какие-то выводы по поводу дел в российской экономике на основании прозвучавших на ПМЭФ заявлений сложно. Все острые углы участники обходили стороной, говорить о проблемах бизнеса было некому, а выставка достижений народного хозяйства на стендах регионов предназначалась, скорее, для пышных пиар-отчетов.

Отсутствие реальной повестки и игнорирование реально важных вопросов в российской экономике привело к тому, что на ПМЭФ-2023 только одна профильная тема обсуждалась относительно полно — дефицит бюджета и возможные источники его наполнения. Эта проблема пока не проявилась в полной мере — согласно последним данным дефицит не превышает четырех триллионов рублей и в конце года власти ожидают его снижения. Закрыть же дыру в бюджете можно сокращением инвестиций, национализацией западных активов, а также ростом налогов, о чем на форуме говорили неохотно и вскользь.

Однако сохранение текущих тенденций и отсутствие перемен в экономической политике вкупе с исчерпанием временных позитивных факторов могут привести к тому, что на ПМЭФ-2024 главной темой обсуждения действительно станут особенности заготовки грибов.

Автор — экономический обозреватель российских изданий. Помимо макроэкономики специализируется в вопросах топливно-энергетического комплекса и денежно-кредитных отношениях. Для «Холода» он пишет анонимно, опасаясь за свою безопасность.