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The new economy: the potential of youth entrepreneurship

14 February 2018

The plenary session ‘The New Economy: The Potential of Youth Entrepreneurship’ was one of the key events of Young Enterprise Day at the Russian Investment Forum. Experts spoke about the role of youth entrepreneurship in the strategy for Russia’s socioeconomic development, tools to facilitate this trend, challenges and difficulties faced by young businessmen, while also discussing the experience of Finnish colleagues.

Moderator Maxim Bouev, Vice-Rector for Strategic Development of the New Economic School, Professor and Dean of the Department of Economics at the European University at St. Petersburg, began the session by quoting British historian Arnold Toynbee. The scholar believed that successful development of any civilization depends on whether or not it has creative personalities with initiative, a clear mind and strong will who can offer effective responses in new situations. According to Mr. Bouev, it is this description of civilization that works well to depict today’s entrepreneurship.

“If our country succeeds in creating conditions for such entrepreneurship, we can be confident that we will cope with any challenge posed by the external environment owing to the concurrence of circumstances,” Maxim Bouev concluded.

Alexey Kudrin, Chairman of the Board of the Centre for Strategic Research Foundation and Deputy Chairman of the Economic Council under the President of the Russian Federation, stressed that the role and development of entrepreneurship constituted key pillars for development of the country and its economy, as well as a source of economic growth. There are 4.3% of entrepreneurs in Russia. In the BRICS countries, the percentage is double that and, in developed countries, it is 2.5 times higher on average. At the same time, only 2% of the Russian people wish to open their own business. In developed countries, the figure is up to 80%.

“We need to teach entrepreneurship right from school age. We need to lower the age of entrepreneurs. One can become an entrepreneur at 14, without parental permission. Then we will teach it in universities,” Mr. Kudrin said.

For his part, Igor Galas, Deputy Governor of the Krasnodar Territory, elaborated on the strategy for development of the Krasnodar Territory up to 2030. He singled out two main trends: reformatting the management system and developing entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial initiative. Today, small and medium-sized businesses account for 35% of the Krasnodar Territory’s GDP. The regional Strategy plans to raise this figure to 50%.

Alexander Bugaev, Head of the Federal Agency for Youth Affairs (Rosmolodezh), said the agency’s key goal was to create as many opportunities as possible for self‑realization of young people. Today, there are several tools for supporting young entrepreneurs. One of them is the programme ‘You are an Entrepreneur’, where the main focus is on education, along with joint projects with public organizations – Programme for Development of Youth Russia-China Business Incubators, projects implemented by the Russian Centre for Promotion of Youth Entrepreneurship (Rospredprinimatel). Mr. Bugayev also pointed to grant programmes for developing self-realization of young people. The amount of support has increased 8-fold to nearly RUB 8.5 bn.

Alexander Kalinin, President of the All-Russian Non-Governmental Organization of Small and Medium-Sized Businesses ‘Opora Russia’, remarked that the small business sector was in demand among young people. According to Opora Russia, 15% of the young population is interested or already working in small business. Mr. Kalinin also elaborated on projects implemented by his organization.

“What are we doing at Opora? We provide connections through our large social network. We provide knowledge because our committee for youth entrepreneurship constantly generates various types of education, recommends where to study, finds mentors.”

Nonna Materkova, Founder of the Creative Industries Support Foundation ‘Creative Practices’, believes that developing youth entrepreneurship in the innovative and creative sector will help in responding to many of today’s challenges. She presented the ‘Masters of Russia’ programme for supporting youth entrepreneurship. It is designed to popularize masters’ products and brands, create an educational environment for young businessmen and shape the business community.

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