Milan to Host 5th International Forum "Moscow-Invest-2002"

On Thursday Milan is hosting the 5th International "Moscow-Invest-2002" Forum, organized by the Moscow International business association.

Russian Minister of Economic Development and Trade German Gref, Minister of Finance Alexei Kudrin, Minister of Industry, Science and Technology Ilya Klebanov, Head of the State Customs Committee Mikhail Vanin, Head of the State Antitrust Policy Committee Ilya Yuzhanov, Russian Federation Central Bank management and head of the Moscow administration structures are expected to attend the forum, the organisers informed RIA Novosti.

The official opening ceremony will be held on Friday. The Moscow and Milan mayors, Yury Luzhkov and Gabriele Albertini, will address the gathering.

Then, a subject and round-table meetings will be held within the framework of the forum. They are expected to focus on the cooperation between Russia and Italy in the interests of common Europe, economic and legal conditions of the Russian business, financial mechanisms to support the bilateral economic ties, the cooperation potential between the Russian Federation regions and foreign partners, as well as practice and problems of the Italian business in Moscow and in Russia.

The closing ceremony will be held on Saturday, October 19.

At present, Italy is one of Russia's leading economic partners, ranking 7th in investment volume in the Russian economy. The 2001 Russian-Italian turnover increased by 30%. Russia-based Italian companies produce consumer goods, are engaged in construction industry, commerce, food, they also ship machinery, equipment, building materials and sanitary equipment.