Cost of Russia's national project to develop electronics industry cut to 2.7 trln rubles to 2030 - paper

MOSCOW. May 17 (Interfax) - The implementation of Russia's national project to develop the country's electronics industry to 2030 will cost 2.74 trillion rubles instead of the previously planned 3.2 trillion rubles.

The project might be funded in part by introducing a recycling fee for electronics, national daily Kommersant reported, citing the latest version of the document. The document was approved by Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin on May 12, the paper said, citing government sources.

The government has already allocated 940.7 billion rubles in budget funding for the project; it will need to allocate an additional 901.6 billion rubles and plans to raise another 940 billion rubles from extra-budgetary sources, project materials show.

Some of the financing might be raised by first introducing marking of products and then a recycling fee for electronics, the document cited by the paper said. The introduction of a recycling fee was conceived in 2021 as a way to support Russian manufacturers, but this measure is expected to push up end prices for products, the paper's sources said.

The RATEK association of electronics and computer equipment retailers and manufacturers, which includes companies such as Apple, Google, Samsung, Dell and M.Video , is categorically opposed to the proposed fee.

A recycling fee would increase the costs of products on the market, which is already not in the best shape, the paper reported RATEK chairman Anton Guskov as saying. Furthermore, this is illogical, since recycling fees should be used for recycling electronics, not for other purposes, he said.

The national project includes four federal projects: Development of Electronics Manufacturing Technologies with a cost of 247.2 billion rubles; Training Workers with a cost of 443 billion rubles; Development of Infrastructure for Civilian Electronics Production with a cost of 880.7 billion rubles; and Applied Research, Development and Rollout with a cost of 1.174 trillion rubles.