If we don't burn out, we'll fly

In Primorye, they took out a 3 billion loan to cover the budget deficit and cut spending on social services and fire safety. Drones are a priority

Primorye saves. There is no longer enough money to install video surveillance in schools, to repair children’s camps, to overhaul and modernize hospitals, to subsidize agriculture, to equip libraries, and so on. At the current session, the Legislative Assembly of the region “cut” 2.9 billion expenditure items to reduce the budget deficit. Judging by the reports of analysts, the region has become one of the first in a series of Russian regions that will have to tighten their belts in the near future.

Revenues for 2026 were increased by 169 million rubles and now amount to 256 billion, expenses were reduced by 2.9 billion (290.2 billion). The budget deficit for this year ultimately amounts to 34.2 billion rubles. It has been reduced by 3.05 billion.

A small part of the deficit, 210 million, will be covered by targeted balances from last year. Of this money, RusHydro will receive 163 million (for tariff equalization), the rest - for early repayment of budget targeted loans.

The most interesting thing is what the region is going to save on. Schools, hospitals, culture and social services. Healthcare will receive a shortfall of 200.5 million rubles. 105 of them are for the design and implementation of major repairs, the purchase of equipment, and fire safety. 101 - for compensation of rental housing for doctors.

Two million - to reimburse hotel expenses for residents of the region with cancer who travel to Vladivostok for treatment or examination, and their accompanying persons. The last two points are in connection with clarifying the number of recipients of such assistance, the region explained. But 8 million will be added for the repair of medical equipment.

809 million were withdrawn from education. Of these, the largest part, 191.6 million, was to be spent on major repairs of municipal health camps. 247.5 million - subsidies to schools for equipping classrooms, providing video surveillance, purchasing consumables, etc. 288.5 million - expenses of secondary specialized educational institutions on “purchase of fixed assets, major repairs, events and others.” 50 million - from gubernatorial grants to the winners of competitions for the renovation of school spaces and canteens. Even the pro-government “Movement of the First” will not receive 12.3 million.

“Little things” were written off from events for children and youth, from subsidies to private kindergartens, universities and the Far Eastern Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences “for the implementation of scientific projects that are winners of the competitive selection for grants from the Russian Science Foundation”, to payments to winners and prize-winners of championships in professional skills (there are fewer competencies participating in competitions).

71.8 million will be written off from the construction of a school in the village of Zima Yuzhnaya “in accordance with the agreement with the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation and the concession agreement.” Let us recall that the previous concessionaire, the East Arctic Oil and Gas Corporation (EAOC), which was supposed to build the school by 2024, was deprived of the right to build in 2023. And the general director of VANK, Stanislav Neverov, was arrested for fraud in May 2024. But the construction of educational institutions in Primorye is a separate type of bullying. Even in Vladivostok, not a single new school has been built in 12 years (although new buildings and microdistricts are growing by leaps and bounds), construction has started in Ussuriysk, and they are looking for a new contractor.

But small schools are being disbanded, closed or merged. Recently, one of these was eliminated in the village of Taiga in the north of Primorye, and a video message from parents to Vladimir Putin’s direct line did not help.

According to the state social support program, spending for 2026 has been reduced by a total of 297 million. The region will not spend 283.3 million on creating a long-term care system for the elderly and disabled in social service institutions. But this function was transferred to non-profit organizations and legal entities (they will receive just 163 million in subsidies). 110 million will be saved on social certificates, their average cost has decreased. 66.5 million will be written off from major repairs of social service institutions. They will save a couple of million on subsidies to businesses for organizing adaptive physical education and sports classes for the disabled. They will add 2.8 million for utility subsidies to commercial enterprises where more than half of their staff are disabled. And 1.8 million - for the purchase of housing for those affected by the August typhoons of 2023 (by court decision). 40 million will be written off from measures to promote employment.

166.7 million will be withdrawn from culture. 20.5 of them are savings on renting premises (some were simply purchased last year). 4.8 million will be saved this year on video surveillance and security measures for regional cultural sites - but they promise to postpone this work to 2027. 15 million will not be spent on the acquisition of “particularly valuable and other movable property”, 23.5 million on repairs and estimates for work (they are delayed), 4 million on scholarships (there are fewer “creative” students).

They will save 58.2 million on regional cultural events due to their postponement and “change of concept”, another 7 - on joint projects with federal institutions. 10.5 million - on tour.

For the sake of saving, the region refuses to modernize municipal libraries (6 million) and support cultural centers (7.35 million). 11.9 million will be written off for the protection of cultural heritage sites.

This year the region will not conduct a complete census of the Amur tiger. In general, 22.1 million rubles will be cut for environmental protection.

406.5 million will not be received by sports. And besides, 14.5 million will be underinvested in the development of municipal sports infrastructure, 12.3 million in skiing events (but he is especially supported by the governor, so they will immediately add 9.9 million to regional institutions for skiing), 6 million in the maintenance of the Fetisov Arena (here, by the way, there is only one question: why does the region maintain it at all?). A little bit at a time, from 1.2 to 5.2 million, they took a bite out of subsidies to municipalities for training athletes according to federal standards, as well as to regional institutions for events to develop international sports relations; from payments to coaches of regional institutions - winners of the Olympic Games, as well as from payments for high results at all-Russian and international competitions; from the construction of an indoor skating rink in the large village of Chuguevka; from the renovation of the CSKA sports club in Vladivostok; from sporting events during the EEF; from major repairs, from the arrangement and equipment of the Olimpiyskaya rowing base in Partizansk (let us remember that Primorye is proud of our Olympic athlete Ivan Shtyl, who, however, has not even trained in the region in recent years).

457.5 million will not be given to the Primorsky Territory Development Corporation for projects to create tourism infrastructure (and rightly so, the Chinese already have enough of everything, but there aren’t really any other tourists).

But 39.4 million will be added to the “Tourist Information Center of the Primorsky Territory”, 48 - to the arrangement and events of the branch of the National Center "Russia" opened in September last year, and another 1.7 - to its permanent exhibition (this is understandable - patriotism is held in high esteem).

It was decided not to spend 76.5 million on communication services in small and taiga villages. 69.5 million were taken from the development of wireless broadband Internet. 175 million will not be invested in subsidies for connecting communication towers to electricity (it’s a pity, because not all sections of the highway in Primorye have internet and even telephone reception). But, let’s say, 23 million will be invested in the Internet in schools and colleges.

Farmers who lease livestock, agricultural machinery, and equipment will “miss” subsidies by 180.3 million.

Also receiving subsidies are those who grow buckwheat and rice and produce priority agricultural crops (soybeans, corn - they will have their aid cut, 50 million each. Also, from subsidies and grants - 10 million will be lost from livestock farms (“to organize measures to improve the recovery from the leukemia virus”), 19 from bakers (“reimbursement of part of the costs associated with the production of social varieties of bread”), 30 from family livestock farms farms, 40 - projects to bring abandoned agricultural land into agricultural circulation. But the ANO “Agency for the Development of Beekeeping of the Primorsky Territory” will receive 35.3 million. The governor loves Primorsky honey, he even insisted on its inclusion in school meals. Last year, in the summer, they even kicked out the “Street of Craftsmen” (a fair of goods of their own production) from a spot on one of the central streets of Vladivostok, and now, somehow it doesn't work.

Every year forests burn in Primorye. Wildfire season is literally starting now. They are extinguished mainly by the Primorsky Air Base. Which this year reduced expenses by 31 million.

In addition, non-program expenses were cut by 115.6 million, including for the reserve of material resources for eliminating natural and man-made emergencies. It’s a pity, typhoons are almost guaranteed in late summer, and fires in spring and autumn.

Small and medium-sized businesses will also receive less subsidies and grants for the purchase of equipment and rental (a total of 25 million). It was a good program; it helped many people start their own businesses.

Expenses for the Entrepreneurship Support Center (48 million in total) and regional institutions under the economic development program (86.8 million) will be greatly reduced.

99 million subsidies are not allocated to the microcredit company “Fund for the Development of Entrepreneurship and Industry of the Primorsky Territory” - it provided loans to industrial enterprises. It was decided not to allocate 25.7 million to businesses to pay interest on bank loans.

But if anyone flies, it’s drones. Increased expenses for:

12.8 million - subsidized by the Autonomous Non-Profit Organization “Center for Unmanned Systems of the Primorsky Territory”;

30 million - for subsidies to industrial enterprises “for financial support of costs associated with carrying out research, developing technologies for improving unmanned aerial vehicles and electronic warfare equipment.”

In addition, at the end of February, the government of Primorye held an auction in order to take a loan from the bank for 3 billion rubles at a floating interest rate: “Key rate + 3%” (18.5% at the moment). The maximum amount of interest, according to auction materials, is almost 1.2 billion.

At the end of last year, the region’s budget deficit amounted to a “record” 1.5 trillion rubles, compared to approximately 400 billion in 2024.

...And in conclusion - “intermediate” results. “Budget deficits have developed in more than 70 regions. Debt obligations of the regions increased by 10.6% year-on-year and amounted to 3.5 trillion rubles. In the debt structure, commercial debt showed a significant increase: bank loans increased by 3.0 times y/y, bond loans - by 6.4% y/y. There was a sharp reversal in the trend towards the commercialization of regional debt due to the need to quickly attract liquidity. Against the background of the still high key rate, the regions tried not to attract bond borrowings in order not to fix high rates for a long time. Nevertheless, 11 regions entered the bond market in 2025, compared to six in 2024. At the same time, the created margin of safety (balances in regional budget accounts at the beginning of the year amounted to 2.9 trillion rubles) supported regional budgets, preventing an even greater increase in debt. The increase in debt was followed by an increase in the debt burden - it increased by 1.1 percentage points. and amounted to 18.9%. Despite the growth, the debt burden is one of the lowest in the last 10 years,” says the report “Growth of regional debt and budget deficit: results of 2025” by the Expert RA analytical center.

Primorye