Are there any revived villages in Russia? Money will flow from the village: how to bring the village back to life
The government and private investors will spend about 300 billion rubles ($9 billion) to increase the investment potential of rural areas and make them more attractive to young professionals. However, some experts believe that the budget of the new state program is too small even to stop the deterioration in the quality of life in Russian villages, not to mention change the situation for the better.
Rural Development Plan
The federal program, approved by Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, includes a plan for the development of the village until 2020. The government allocated for new program 300 billion rubles, of which 90 billion will be allocated from federal budget, 150 billion from regions and municipalities, and the remaining 60 billion will come from private sources.The rural development plan calls for the provision of 42,000 housing units for young families, the construction of schools and health centers, and the connection of villages to gas and water networks.
Program problems
However, experts have serious doubts about the success of the new program. About 30% of Russians this moment live in rural areas, so the allocated amount will be only a tiny contribution. “We agreed with the fact that federal funding will not be able to cover all the existing problems of our villages, so we decided to concentrate all resources and investments in those settlements where investment projects are already being implemented and will continue to develop,” said Dmitry Toropov, head of the department rural development in the Ministry Agriculture. Most of the money will be issued as grants to regions whose proposals have greater investment potential. However, according to Daria Snitko, an analyst at the Center for Economic Forecasts, the problem is that many regional authorities do not have enough money to match the federal funding project. Some regions have already rejected financial assistance in the amount of 5 billion rubles, since they do not have enough funds to co-finance the program.Moreover, even if all stages of the program are achieved, village residents will by no means enjoy the same benefits as city residents. From the very beginning, the program's goals set the level of increasing the incomes of village residents to 50% of the amount that a person living in the city can earn.
Kamil Khairullin, St. Petersburg entrepreneur
Builds houses in native village Sultanovo, Chelyabinsk region, to revive the village:
“In general, my idea was to build several houses in order to attract capable people to the village. At a general village meeting, the villagers decided: the village desperately needs a paramedic. Then it was decided that one of the three houses planned for construction would be given to a paramedic. In total, I am ready to build about 20 houses, the main thing is that people come to live in them, ready to work for the benefit of themselves and the village.
About the construction of houses
I have no master plan for the revival of the village. I proceed from the demands of life. Houses will be built as more people want to move to Sultanovo. Moreover, I must understand that these people will strengthen my village. Everything will be organized for them. I am currently building four houses to show people that I am serious about my intentions. I also need to understand what will happen next: if the village requires a lot of resources to support itself, then this is one situation, but if we manage to launch several projects that can pay for themselves and provide jobs for the villagers, then it will be completely different. One way or another, the development of events will influence how willing I am to invest my resources in the village. Now in the village, in parallel with the construction of houses, a goat farm is being built. Another project is a cheese factory, which will be run by one of the local residents, whom I helped purchase equipment and learn how to make cheese.
About the poultry farm
I have never been away from my village, and I often go there now. My sisters still live in Sultanovo. My village is always in my soul. I thought a lot about how to help so that she would not disappear, but I understood that my strength alone was not enough for this. Life began to gradually revive from the moment the poultry farm was built, but if it had been built a few years earlier, my village would not have reached such a deplorable state. Why were young people leaving? Because there was absolutely no opportunity to earn money to live. The poultry farm is a great help for the villagers, but the problem is that by the time of its construction the youth had dispersed better life. Now there are people working at the poultry farm, but they are already old, but I would like to make sure that young people are in Sultanovo.
About potential residents of Sultanovo
The Bashkirs have traditionally been engaged in livestock farming, so if there are owners who are ready to live in Sultanovo and raise livestock, it would be great. I will not refuse help to those who, for example, decide to engage in crop farming. The main thing is that the person convinces me that he really needs it. Will they want to raise ostriches? You can do them too, the main thing is that the person sees meaning in it for himself.
I am interested in people coming to the village who are full of desire to develop their own direction, to take responsibility for their life and the life of my village.
In addition, I expect that in addition to farms, we will have more technologically advanced and knowledge-intensive industries where people can work. The main thing is that life in the village comes to life, I am sure that then not only I, but also other sponsors will invest money in the village.
In addition to having a job and housing, people should be united by leisure. I would really like my village to become the center of Bashkir culture.
About infrastructure
Infrastructure plays an important role in the decision of those who plan to move to the village to live. Now we are carrying out serious work on its creation: we are laying a water and gas pipeline, and we are concerned about the availability of a road. The state promises to help with the Internet.
About the reaction of local residents
The villagers are accustomed to the way of life in which they have existed for the last 30 years. Initially they decided to just see what I would do. What kind of village man? He went out in the morning, looked at the weather and decided what to do; he always acts according to the circumstances. So it is here. I can’t say that there is any opposition, but there are no zealous enthusiasts either. For people to fully believe in my endeavors, they must feel positive changes in their income, and for this they need to work and develop. I also explain their inertia by the fact that everything new is unusual for a person. Strangers moving into new homes may have an impact on their lives in unclear ways. Today they live calmly, but suddenly a neighbor appears, and a successful one at that, then the person will begin to compare himself with him - his comfort zone will be violated.
About the revival of the village and filial duty
It is important for me to preserve my native village, but since we see negative dynamics, we have to talk about its revival. I remember my childhood, when the streets were full of children. Now there is no such thing. Of course, in pure form I can’t return my childhood, but I can try to improve life in the village. I can't give such a clear answer as to why this is important to me. People's actions are determined by what gives them pleasure. If a person feels good because his yacht has become one meter larger, then this is one conversation, but someone, like me, feels good because he knows that I am helping my village. I have always been involved in charity work and have always set myself the task of not becoming a slave to money and success. I am proud that I grew up in a small Bashkir village, that it gave me such genes, so I want to return part of my filial debt.
On the prospects of the Russian village
I am sure that if we look at the long term (about 100 years in the future), then the Russian village has good chances, because the main black soil in the world is located here, as well as fresh water. Sooner or later, people will come to power who will see prospects in this and use them. The only important thing is that our country can maintain its independence. In this case, Russia can become a country that not only supplies raw materials, but also ensures global food security.
About the strength and desire to develop his native village
I have been used to working since childhood. There is always strength. It will be bad if suddenly this operating voltage disappears. What about time? A person will always find time for what is important to him. I don’t have the task of feeding my family, expanding my living space, buying a car - I have all this, and I don’t strive for more, because I believe that a person should be enough with what he has. One cannot think that a person’s happiness directly depends on material well-being. Happiness is deeper, it is inside a person, in his actions.
About the development of Sultanovo in the future
I'm not a romantic, I stand firmly on the ground. If we talk about Sultanovo, I want the village to finally have a central water supply, gas, an asphalt road, so that 20 strong owners with their subsidiary plots and there were 50 children at school and kindergarten. If I manage to achieve this, then I will consider that I did not live my life in vain.”
For questions about moving to Sultanovo, you can contact the patron’s representative by phone: 8-911-111-83-33.
Russian villages and hamlets can become the locomotive of the domestic economy, a center for food supply and conservation cultural heritage. Representatives of the federal and regional Public Chambers of the Russian Federation, Popular Front activists and officials discussed the issue of reviving the village at the first regional forum for the development of rural areas “The Village is the Soul of Russia”.
Secretary of the Public Chamber of the Russian Federation Alexander Brechalov noted that the value of the forum lies in the fact that activists, representatives of business and government, and NGOs gathered on one platform, who together can develop common solutions.
According to the forum participants, there are quite a lot of problems in Russian villages: bad roads, small aircraft that were destroyed during the perestroika era, which served as the main transport artery to the ranks of remote northern villages, low level medical care, outflow of young people due to lack of jobs, high average age population and even the absence of applicants for official positions.
“We cannot now find heads of administrations of rural areas. Now we are faced with the fact that no one is going to this position. That is, we cannot even head a rural settlement, let alone force it to work,” noted Dmitry, Chairman of the Public Chamber of the Arkhangelsk Region Sizeva.
According to the first deputy governor Vologda region Alexey Sherlygin, low prices agricultural products discourage villagers from cultivating the land. "The extinction of the countryside, unfortunately, has become noticeable and systemic. There is a continued intensification of the urbanization process in many regions of the country, literally emptying of rural areas. This has become a problem not only for regions with high level development of agriculture, but also for us - regions-opzlots of the agro-industrial complex of Russia," he said.
As the head of the Tarnogsky district, Sergei Gusev, noted, to revive villages it is necessary not only to raise the cost of agricultural products, which is the main source of income for the family, but also to develop infrastructure and build new housing.
Meanwhile, the decision on additional funding rural projects may be accepted as early as late March - early April. At this time, President Vladimir Putin will sign a decree on the creation of a grant operator to allocate subsidies to NPOs whose projects are aimed at reviving the village.
"The whole last year The Public Chamber at the Community forums discussed the idea of creating a new grant operator for NGOs implementing their projects in rural areas. We heard many proposals from activists and NGOs and passed them on to the president. He supported our proposals, and we hope that in the near future a grant operator will appear that will support projects only in rural areas and small towns,” Brechalov noted.
The problem of village extinction is quite acute in Russia. According to the Public Chamber, in the period from 2002 to 2010, the number of villages decreased by 8.5 thousand, this also happened due to the fact that most rural settlements were given the status of cities and urban-type settlements, as well as their liquidation by decisions local authorities with natural decline and migration outflow of the population. As a result of the census, it turned out that 19.4 thousand settlements have almost no population.
In our Time of Troubles changes, where every news emanates negativity, I came across interesting video O modern revival Russian village and about the person who does it. I highly recommend it to everyone. It’s great that the process has begun and many people have had positive results in rebuilding villages. Such villages are perhaps the hope for the salvation of Russia. Gleb Tyurin came up with the idea of reviving northern villages by organizing TOSs in them - Societies of Territorial-Public Self-Government. What Tyurin did in 4 years in the godforsaken outback of Arkhangelsk has no precedents. The expert community cannot understand how he succeeds: Tyurin’s social model is applicable in an absolutely marginal environment and is not expensive. In Western countries, similar projects would cost orders of magnitude more. Amazed foreigners vying with each other to invite the Arkhangelsk resident to share his experience in all kinds of forums - in Germany, Luxembourg, Finland, Austria, the USA. Tyurin spoke in Lyon at the World Summit local communities, the World Bank is actively interested in his experience. How did this all happen?
Gleb began to travel to bearish corners to find out what people there could do for themselves. Conducted dozens of village meetings. “Local citizens looked at me as if I had fallen from the moon. But in any society there is a healthy part that is capable of being responsible for something.” Gleb Tyurin believes that today it is necessary not so much to argue about theories as to think about the realities of life. Therefore, he tried to reproduce the traditions of the Russian zemstvo in modern conditions. Here's how it happened and what came out of it.
– We began to travel to villages and gather people for meetings, organize clubs, seminars, business games and God knows what else. They tried to stir up people who were depressed, believing that everyone had forgotten about them, that no one needed them, and that nothing could work out for them. We have developed technologies that sometimes allow us to quickly inspire people and help them look at themselves and their situation differently.
The Pomeranians begin to think, and it turns out that they have a lot of things: forest, land, real estate, and other resources. Many of which are ownerless and dying. For example, a closed school or kindergarten is immediately plundered. Who? Yes, the local population itself. Because everyone is for themselves and strives to snatch at least something for themselves. But they destroy a valuable asset that can be preserved and made the basis for the survival of a given territory. We tried to explain at peasant gatherings: the territory can only be preserved together. We found within this disillusioned rural community a group of people charged with positivity. They created a kind of creative bureau out of them, taught them to work with ideas and projects. This can be called a social consulting system: we trained people in development technologies. As a result, over 4 years, the population of local villages implemented 54 projects worth 1 million 750 thousand rubles, which gave an economic effect of almost 30 million rubles. This is a level of capitalization that neither the Japanese nor the Americans have, given their advanced technologies.
Principle of efficiency
“What makes up a multiple increase in assets? Due to synergy, due to the transformation of scattered and helpless individuals into a self-organizing system. Society represents a set of vectors. If some of them were combined into one, then this vector is stronger and larger than arithmetic sum those vectors from which it is composed...”
The villagers receive a small investment, write the project themselves and become the subject of the action. Formerly a man from the regional center pointed his finger at the map: this is where we will build a cowshed. Now they themselves are discussing where and what they will do, and they are looking for the cheapest solution, because they have very little money. The coach is next to them. His task is to lead them to a clear understanding of what they are doing and why, how to create that project, which, in turn, will lead to the next one. And so that everyone new project made them economically more and more self-sufficient. In most cases, these are not business projects in a competitive environment, but a stage of acquiring resource management skills. To begin with, very modest. But those who have passed through this stage can already move on.
In general, this is some form of change in consciousness. The population, which begins to become aware of itself, creates a certain capable body within itself and gives it a mandate of trust. What is called the body of Territorial Public Self-Government - TOS. Essentially, this is the same zemstvo, although somewhat different than it was in the 19th century. Then the zemstvo was caste - merchants, commoners. But the meaning is the same: a self-organizing system that is tied to the territory and is responsible for its development. People are beginning to understand that they are not just solving the problem of water or heat supply, roads or lighting: they are creating the future of their village. The main products of their activities are a new community and new relationships, a development perspective. TOS in its village creates and tries to expand the zone of well-being. Nth amount successful projects in one locality builds up a critical mass of positive things that changes the whole picture in the area as a whole. So the streams merge into one big full-flowing river...
Source – “Advisor” – a guide to good books.
