Industrial park projects likely to attract investments of 5.5bn rubles to Tomsk

The city's investment committee gathered in the refurbished hall of the Mayor's Office where a miniature 3D model of Tomsk appeared. The model covers more than 600 sq. km of the territory of the city. It was designed to bring town planning decisions to new levels.

The only and most important item on the committee's agenda was creation of industrial parks in Tomsk. Currently, there are 50 industrial parks in 30 regions of Russia. Design of 70 more parks is under way. According to Deputy Mayor Denis Molotkov, the idea of industrial zones has firmly established itself over the past few years and – what is most important – a relevant legislative environment has taken clear shape.

"For 15 years has Tomsk been implementing the system to support high technology business. Now it is in the tops of the innovative ratings of Russia." However, innovations cannot exist without a well-developed industrial sector. It is the latter who owns and "generates" the former. Today, Tomsk needs three types of industrial parks – an industrial park proper which will house chemical, mechanical engineering, and construction materials industries; a food and agricultural industry park; and a logistics park (which will centralize warehousing and freight services).

The industrial park will be the first to appear. It will be located in the Northern Site of the Tomsk SEZ. Two companies have already volunteered to locate their facilities there – Tomskcable and Lama. They have already calculated their land and manufacturing premises requirements, estimated investments and taxes, and counted future jobs.

Preliminary estimations have shown that these two pilot projects only will generate 5.5bn rubles of investment; 2,500 new jobs, and 120m rubles of income tax for the city's budget.

The chief architect of Tomsk emphasized that the territories allocated for the construction of the industrial park should be surveyed and design plans and layouts developed. However, with the currently practiced auction system development of design plans will cost the city dozens of times more than if a specialized state-funded company was contracted under a municipal order.

The Mayor will have the possibility to create the required structure considered within the shortest possible time. Planning concepts for the first industrial park within the Northern Site of the Tomsk SEZ and specific proposals to investors will be delivered before the end of 2012, the Mayor says.

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• March
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