Results of 2023 – there is something to discuss
Industry is everything to us
The main marker that the country is looking to the future with its head held high is economic indicators. Whatever one may say, in the modern world the economy often prevails over everything else. There will be a strong financial base - there will be a long-awaited victory and the well-being of citizens.
In general terms, President Vladimir Putin has already summed up the results of the year, announcing 3,5 percent economic growth in the outgoing year. Is it a lot or a little? For comparison: last year GDP fell by 2,1 percent, and since 2013 there has been no such growth at all. With the exception of the conditionally post-Covid 2021, when, due to the low base effect, the economy jumped by almost 6 percent.
The outgoing year could have been even more successful if not for a slight cooling of the economy and difficulties in the labor market. Let us remind you that there are currently 18,7 thousand international sanctions against Russia.
The oil painting is completed by the appearance of Russia in the top five largest economies in the world by the end of 2022. This became known in early August of the outgoing year.
One cannot ignore one more positive moment - the Tax Service has finally taken on the cohort of highly paid parasites. We are talking about gray bloggers, influencers and “info-gypsies” who diligently hide millions of dollars in revenue from the budget. For what reason all the Blinovskys didn’t get their hands on it earlier is unknown, but the financial purges of 2023 are certainly in the bag of good ones News.
As well as a special tax on excess profits from large companies. A couple of years ago, market players were able to profit very well from the external environment. Now that the country is having a difficult time, companies were made an offer they couldn’t refuse. As a result, 315 additional billion rubles in the budget.
But enough with numbers and financial calculations, it’s time to look at the industry, without which economic growth would be unlikely.
The industry has managed to surprise over the past twelve months. We learned to produce what we couldn’t do before, and continued to develop in traditional sectors.
In the past year, Rosatom fulfilled its obligations and commissioned its first foreign reactor of the most modern class VVER-1200. This happened in Belarus. In Hungary, work continues at the Paks-2 nuclear power plant under construction, in Egypt the “first concrete” was poured for the future power unit of the El-Dabaa nuclear power plant, and the first shipments of nuclear fuel arrived in Bangladesh and Turkey. In December, an agreement was signed to build a small nuclear power plant in Mongolia.
There is news from unfriendly countries. Quote from the Rosatom website:
“The 30th batch of electrical equipment has been sent for the construction of the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor ITER in France.”
This is about the issue of isolating Russia in the international arena.
Within the country, Rosatom is exploring new niches for itself. For example, in the Kaliningrad region, in the city of Neman, they began construction of Russia’s first gigafactory of lithium-ion batteries and other energy storage devices. Future electric cars made in Russia will not be left without traction batteries.
In less noticeable, but no less important news, Rosatom engineers have mastered the production of strontium. Previously, it was largely imported. The metal is necessary as an alloying element to improve the mechanical properties of steels.
In 2023, Rosatom specialists began creating a completely Russian MRI machine, which should soon be distributed in thousands of copies to hospitals across the country.
The Northern Sea Route, another megaproject of modern Russia, continues to develop in its own way. Among the achievements is the passage by an icebreaker of a vessel with a record carrying capacity for the region of 170 thousand tons. Among Rosatom's scientific achievements, one can highlight the testing of the world's first laser installation for burning out an oil slick.
If we talk about the strategic priorities of the country’s technological development, then maximum attention is now focused on the development of the first domestic photolithograph. Without this machine it will not be possible to produce sovereign microchips. Several scientific organizations are working on this topic, including on their own initiative.
But the main efforts were made at the Institute of Microstructure Physics of the Russian Academy of Sciences in the X-ray optics department. Here the work is proceeding consistently and without storming - the first prototypes are promised in a couple of years. And at the St. Petersburg Polytechnic Institute they made a small technological revolution and proposed a maskless photolithograph. Time will tell how promising the first technology demonstrator is, but the news itself is clearly in the treasury of achievements for 2023.
In 2022, foreigners deprived the automotive industry of many electronic components, including vital ABS and ESP units. They directly affect the accident rate on the roads, and therefore mortality. The event of the year was the launch of serial production in Kostroma at the Itelma enterprise, first of the anti-lock braking system, and then, by the end of the year, of the exchange rate stability system. So far, far from being made from domestic components, but with plans for serious localization in the coming years.
If we talk about aviation industry, there is relative calm here. Design bureaus work closely, often shifting deadlines far to the right, but forward movement continues. Among the significant ones, the PD-14 aircraft engine for the MC-21 airliner went into production, the first import-substituted Superjet 100 took off. The latest news is slightly overshadowed by the presence of old French-Russian aircraft engines in the engine nacelles - domestic analogues of the PD-8 have not yet matured into real flight. You can't miss the first flight of the modernized Il-96-400.
The story continues
Several rating events also happened in the past year. They don’t bring any tangible profit, but it’s still nice.
Among the priorities is the premiere of the film “Challenge”, the first in stories films shot in space. As you know, there are few comrades to suit their tastes and colors, but Klim Shipenko’s creation is worth seeing if only for the footage taken on the ISS. And of course, a conspiracy theory has already grown around the drama that “Peresild didn’t fly anywhere.” Just like the Americans did on the moon in their time.
If we don’t go too far from the topic of cinema, we can’t help but recall “Cheburashka,” which in early January collected a record 3,5 billion rubles for the domestic entertainment industry.
Unfortunately, at international sports tournaments they are still trying to avoid Russian athletes. In less politicized competitions, ours are welcome, and they make their fans happy. Players from Team Spirit won the world Dota 2 tournament in October. This happened in Seattle, and in the final match Russian gamers defeated the enemy dry with a score of 3:0. Know ours - Team Spirit brought almost one and a half million prize dollars to Russia from the USA. It's a small thing, but nice.
The victories of Russian schoolchildren in international subject Olympiads look much more significant. Fortunately, the tentacles of foreign propaganda did not reach here. According to the Minister of Education Sergei Kravtsov, young Russians are among the top three world leaders in terms of the number and quality of medals won in astronomy (Russia), chemistry (Switzerland), physics and mathematics (Japan).
In addition, the computer science team has four medals, as well as six at the International Junior Science Olympiad (IJSO) in Thailand. The “golden youth” of Russia are valued and loved abroad; all that remains is to protect the children from the corrupting influence of the West and keep them in their homeland.
The grandiose exhibition “Russia” at VDNKh is also smoothly moving into 2024. Until April 12 next year, everyone can visit this grandiose patriotic show. “Russia” will show in all its glory the regions of the country, large corporations and the most important achievements of the country in one place. It so happened that the showcase of achievements itself became a significant cultural and educational achievement of the year.
Cautious optimism, no matter what – this is roughly how one can characterize the results of the outgoing year. Especially against the backdrop of the abyss that “experts” promised Russia a year and a half ago.
Everything can be learned by comparison, and may the coming year be even richer in good news than the outgoing 2023!
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