News of the year 2009

Governor of St. Petersburg Valentina Matvienko has proposed to create a legislative framework for the collection of a new tax on tourism. As an example of the long and successful existence of such a gathering, Mrs. Matvienko has led Europe and the United States, where the tax is called the “city tax” and is usually included in hotel bills. So often a tourist pays it, not even knowing it.

On Thursday, December 17, a high-speed train “Sapsan” made his first trip on a route Moscow – St. Petersburg.

In the course of Russian- Italian consultations that took place in the beginning of December in Rome, President of Russia Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister of Italy Silvio Berlusconi have discussed the number of the questions connected with collaboration of two countries.

Last week Duma has adopted a number of amendments to the Code of administrative violation, which extends the retaliation for violation of public order on board of aircraft and in airport.

The 25th of November 2009, in Terminal “Aeroexpress” of Sheremetyevo International Airport the solemn opening of the first Russian capsule hotel “Air express” was hold.

17 November the winter navigation on Moscow River was opened. Now river rows in Moscow are all year round.

According to the press service of OJSC “Sheremetyevo international airport” soon the airport terminal symbols will be changed from digital to lettering. As stated in a press release, “This decision is taken to streamline terminal identification, taking into account apparition of new complexes and forward-looking development of the airport”.

From 9 to 12 November in London will take place one of the largest international tourism exhibitions in Europe – World Travel Market (WTM). It will take up residence in the great exhibition complex “ExCel” in Docklands. According to Rosturism, taking into account the long and successful cooperation with Moscow and Moscow's participation as an official partner in the exhibition WTM-2005, Russia is granted with a stand in the best part of the hall – in the centre of S7 place EM5040.

Last week The President of Ecuador Rafael Correa has visited Russia. The purpose of the visit was negotiations on the development of cooperation between two countries and signing of a number of documents to facilitate this cooperation.

According to “Interfax”, one of the main subjects of negotiations between the leaders of Foreign Affairs of Russia and Great Britain Sergey Lavrov and David Miliband, to be held in Moscow on 2 November, will be the project of simplification of the visa regime.

The 15th of October this year is the 75 anniversary since the first passenger train took the trip from the Metro station “Komsomolskaya” to the station “Sokolniki”.

The formation of a new public company “Rosavia”, which will bring together leading Russian air carriers, will be completed by 2012.

The 1 October 2009 came into force an agreement on simplification of visa system between the Russian Federation and the Kingdom of Denmark. The agreement was signed the 27 May, 2008.

This year in one of the most popular health resorts of Austria in Zelden will be organized the third annual festival “Russians in Austria”.

According to the balance of the first quarters of the year 2009, Moscow had a fall of tourist stream. In the first half of the year it was by 18.6 % tourists less than a year before, it's a little more than 1.5 million persons.

On the conference this week in the medium center “Izvestya” the head of the Rostourism Anatoly Yarotchkin balanced the summer tourist season.

In the beginning of the week the delegation of the Federal Council of the development of the state border visited the region of Kaliningrad to appreciate the work of the border services.

The Moscow government continues realizing the project “Airports – city centre”. The 27th of August 2009 took place opening of the new railway branch between railway station Belorussky and airport “Sheremetyevo”. The route on the air express takes only 35 minutes.

22 August in Russia was celebrated a relatively new, but already popular, feast – The day of the state flag. This holiday was established in 1994 by Decree of the first Russian President Boris Yeltsin, and the flag was approved as a state symbol in 1991 by Supreme Soviet of RSFSR after the fall of the ruling party.

As the ambassador of Russia Alexander Veshnyakov announced on the 12th of August the visa-free mode between Russia and Latvia will be introduced within 5 years.

The 6th of August press-service of “Russian railway” announced the beginning of the realization of “Program of complex modernization and development of railway stations till 2015”.

Federal Customs Service of Russia proposes to amend the law on the currency regulation and control. These amendments are based on European standards of legislation of the fight against financial crimes and money laundering.

The 24th of July in Moscow took place a meeting of the Coordinating council on disabled persons affairs. On this meeting mayor of Moscow Yuri Luzhkov announced that till the beginning of 2010 all the cultural and sport centers of the city must be adapted for the attendance of disabled persons.

On Thursday, 17 July, in Bavaria in the residence of the Bavarian Kings completed another Russian-German Forum “Dialogue in Saint Petersburg”.

According to the annual rating published last week consulting company Mercer Human Resource Consulting, Moscow is on the third place in the list of the world most expensive cities for the foreigners.

On Monday 29th June in Moscow took place the meeting of vice-mayor of Moscow on the problems of the inter regional cooperation, sport and tourism in the government of Moscow Sergey Berdakov and head of the committee of Moscow tourism Gregory Antyufiev with the administrators of the hotels and tour operators.

From June 2009 the company “Aeroflot – Russian airlines” proposes to its passengers departing from terminals of the airport Sheremetyevo a new service – registration on-line for the trip.

The handling capacity of Sheremetyevo–3 will be 12.5 millions passengers a year.

On the 9th June the government adopted the law “On the entry of changes in the Code of the Russian Federation about the administrative infractions”. It specifies sanctions for the non-observance of the security rules during the flight. The project of the law was presented by the vice-minister of transport Sergey Aristov.

This year will be celebrated the 110th anniversary of the Moscow tram. For this date in June the tram review is planned. It will be open with the famous horse-drawn tram with imperial (tram of 2 floors) – it hasn’t appeared in the streets of the city for about 90 years, and it will be closed with the actual carriage, what the inhabitants of the capital take each morning to go for the work. In total there will be 10 carriages that will take part in this review.

On the meeting of the inter-departmental commission on the problems of the protection of the lake Baikal that took place the 27th May the participants discussed questions on the development of the special economic zones of the recreation and tourism and the question of the destruction of the waste of the cellulose enterprise of Baikal that for several years was the leading enterprise of the region.

The 19 May took place an interview with the president of the Russian union of tour industry Sergey Shpilko organized by the journal “Kommersant” where M. Shpilko answered the questions of readers of the journal. The questions concerned the law on the financial guaranties, the state of the tourist branch in Russia, the perspectives in the development and the influence of crises on the interior tourism and entry tourism.

The hole list of ports with favorable terms of stay for foreigners is determined. In the list: port of Vyborg, “Passagirskii port of St Petersburg” , “Big port of St Petersburg” and ports of Kaliningrad, Sochi, Novorossiisk and Sakhalin region.

The 10th May in Moscow in the sports complex ”Olimpiysky” started the international contest of the pop music “Eurovision”. It became possible due to the victory of Dima Bilan last year in the contest in Belgrade. This year the representative of Russia will be Anastasiya Prikhodko, Ukraine singer with the song “Mamo” written specially by Konstantine Meladze.

Le 28 avril 2009 dans la capitale de Norvège Oslo a eu lieu la réunion du groupe norvégien-russe sur la question des technologies et innovations informatiques et communicatives.

The 22th of April in the press-center of RIA “Novosti” took place a press-conference of the director of the Consular Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation Andrey Karlov, confined to the 200 anniversary of the Consular Service in Russia.

On Saturday April 18 in Moscow Kremlin took place the opening of the fifth season of tourist program, where enters the ceremonial parade of the horse and foot guard of presidential regiment.

On April 8 in the informing agency “Rosbalt” took place the presentation of report “Make that you preach: the prospect for visa-free regime between Russia and European Union”. The report was presented by one of the authors – Arkady Moshes, director of the Russian program of the Finnish institute of international relations.

On March 31 in the Federal Council of the Russian Federation was leading a round-table discussion on the subject: “The improvement of normative-lawful base in the field of the tourism in Russian Federation”.

On March 24 the government approved the project of the conversion of Moscow into the world financial center.

On March 18 the administration of the Federal Service of the tariffs of Russia – in response to the proposal of capital airports – made the decision to change the existing tariffs for the ground handling for foreign boards.

In May this year in Moscow the most popular song contest Eurovision will take place. The contest will pass from May 1 to 16 in the Olympic Stadium. More than forty countries have already confirmed their participation in the contest.

According to the communication of Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia on March 6 will inure the agreement between the Russian Federation and the Venezuela about the renunciation of the visa formalities.

On January 22, 2009 the President of Russia Dmitry Medvedev signed the instruction about holding in 2010 the year of Russia in France and years of France in Russia.

Because of the crisis the attitude to the tourism in Russia has changed. The tour managers began to pay more attention to the development of the new itineraries, services in the sphere of the inner tourism as well as to the foreign citizens traveling to Russia.

This year the celebration of the Pancake week, which takes place in Russia every year, will be organized in London as well.

From March 18 to 21 the 16th international exhibition “Journey and Tourism” organized by company ITE will take place in Expocentre on Krasnopresnenskaya.

The 28th January 2009 an enlarged session of the presidium of the ministry board of Sport, Tourism and Youth Politics took place. During the meeting the Chef of the department Vitalii Mootko announced some amendments of the law “On the foundations of the tourist industry in Russian Federation” that must start working next season.

The services of Russian visa center that opened on January, 23 in Great Britain can be used by all the inhabitants of the country regardless of citizenship. On January, 30 the same center will be opened in Edinburgh, Scotland.

The term “ecological tourism” was introduced in the eightieth years of 20 centuries by ecologist Hector Tseballosom Laskuriey. In Russia the idea of leisure, safe for nature and useful for the man, got accustomed practically immediately – for the completely intelligible reasons.

In connection with the crisis, which caused ever growing unemployment, the government of Moscow decided to take the measures, which must regulate the relations between the employers, the foreign workers and the Muscovites, who lost work.