The government allocated 1 billion rubles to cover the debts of the Great Russian Encyclopedia

The Russian government allocated 1 billion rubles to the Great Russian Encyclopedia non-profit organization, which manages the educational project of the same name. Forbes reports this with reference to the agenda for the meeting of the presidium of the government commission on digital development on December 12. The money was allocated within the framework of “Ensuring the implementation of programs and projects in the field of the digital economy and the development of the information society” of the state program “Information Society”.

These funds should also be used to pay off wage arrears. BDT employees have been complaining about salary delays since at least June of this year. Against this background, the project website stopped updating, and the media reported that the project was, in principle, planned to be closed, and all the accumulated materials were transferred to the “Russian analogue of Wikipedia” “Ruviki”. As a former BDT employee familiar with the situation told The Insider, the reason for the termination of funding could not have been an official decision, but bureaucratic difficulties:

“The money should have been transferred by the Ministry of Digital Development. They played for time for three months and in every possible way mocked us with requests in the spirit of “send us a report on how BDT differs from Wikipedia,” “now send the same thing, only in a sign,” “send us errors from Wikipedia,” etc. Ultimately, the period from The 90 days allotted by law for transferring money has ended, they haven’t transferred anything.”

The printed version of BRE was published from 2004 to 2017. During this time, 35 volumes were collected. In 2019, a scientific and educational portal was launched, which continued to complement and expand the printed version.