 janina de Guzman Fears of hunger: Crowds swarm the Vladivostok Bread Factory. |
By Janina de Guzman
In a move to ease the squeeze on wallets brought on by the ruble devaluation, the krai administration and Primorye Duma are taking steps to shore up reserves of food and medicine, combat skyrocketing prices, prevent tax evasion, and seek a source of food for the winter ahead.
Primorsky Duma Chairman Sergei Dudnik told reporters Sept. 14 that recovery from the fallout of the ruble devaluation will not be a matter of weeks or months, but years.
“What we’re going through now, it’s just the tip of the iceberg,” Dudnik said. “The overall problem is significantly deeper. It will be a year or a year and a half before Primorye can pull itself out of this hole. … Our system is in a crisis.”
Dudnik’s assessment followed a week of emergency meetings, during which krai officials announced price controls on a wide range of food staples, including flour, oil, tea, eggs, and milk.
On Sept. 12, Krai Duma deputies voted on two decrees, one addressed to Primorye, one to the federal government in Moscow, in which they outlined their recipe for stabilization. In a separate address to Primorye residents, Duma deputies urged calm, warning against “acts capable of pushing people toward an irreversible development of events.”
Dudnik said recovery depends 50 percent on regional initiatives and 50 percent on Moscow.
On the home front, deputies urged krai officials to create a special reserve of foodstuffs and medication. They pledged to regulate prices on utilities and staples, and promised to seek funds to settle back wages for teachers, doctors, and cultural workers.
By Sept. 25, the deputies planned to draft a package of measures to bolster the krai’s agriculture and food production.
In their decree to Moscow, the deputies demanded money owed Primorye from the federal budget. As of Sept. 1, the krai had received only 44 percent of the 1.6 million rubles ($129,000) in transfers promised by Moscow this year. The Ministry of Finance has yet to approve subsidies for September, Dudnik said.
Deputies asked the federal government to cough up 1.87 billion rubles in unpaid bills and orders.
Aiming to bolster the region’s food supply, they asked for increased quotas for fish harvesting and temporary easing of customs on imported staples.
Primorye Duma deputies also asking to be plugged into a program in which South Asian countries are repaying debts to the former Soviet Union. Primorye wants $50 million in foodstuffs such as Vietnamese cooking oil. Imported foods — which account for 65-90 percent of meat, dairy products, cooking oil, baby food, wheat, and flour — have become prohibitively expensive.
Local newspapers published the Duma’s message to Primorye residents this week. Dudnik will deliver the government decree to the Federation Council and State Duma after final touches.
Duma deputies, following the initiative of Communist Deputy Tatyana Chernousova, voted to strike President Boris Yeltsin from the list of “respected” entities addressed by the decree. The decision was a vote of no-confidence for a president many feel is out of the picture.
“In my mind the term respect and [Yeltsin] don’t belong together,” said Chernousova, a representative from Chernigovsky County. “I can’t call him ‘respected’ when children are dying in my county.”
Two weeks ago, the Duma voted not to support a petition demanding Yeltsin’s resignation. After the Sept. 12 meeting, Chernousova collected deputies’ signatures on a petition calling for Yeltsin’s retirement. By mid-week, 24 of the 39 deputies had signed the petition.
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