Session of Presidential Science and High Technologies Council

The presidential Science and High Technologies Council gathered on Tuesday to discuss problems and prospects for research centers known as academic towns.

Opening the session, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that the main problems of science and technologies were present in a visible and concentrated form in the so-called academic towns, or territories with a vast scientific and technical potential.

Changes in the economy and governance have revealed that research centers are extremely dependent on centralized financing and are also isolated from modern economic processes and industrial requirements, said the president, adding that it was vitally important to work out "new adequate models of combining the country's economic, industrial and scientific interests." He said the main task was to retain and make good use of the academic towns' unique scientific-and-technical and staff potential, and also to specify the most effective forms of this process.

According to his words, the Council's working group and the government have prepared their proposals on the subject and must look for a final decision together. Putin then suggested that members of the Council focus their attention on this particular subject and view it from the viewpoint of innovation economy as well as from other angles.

He also noted that it would be expedient to discuss ways to combine budget financing of science, state order and innovation capabilities of Russian business.