On November 26, in Kazan, Tatarstan President Rustam Minnikhanov took part in a meeting held by Assistant to the Russian President Igor Levitin on organization of work for the implementation of orders of the President of the Russian Federation following the meeting of the State Council of the Russian Federation "On improving the road network for integrated development of territories of the Russian Federation.”

Opening the meeting, Levitin first of all thanked its participants and personally the Head of the working group – Tatarstan President Rustam Minnikhanov for preparation of the meeting of the State Council of the Russian Federation held in Novosibirsk on October 8 of the current year.

Levitin reminded the words of the Russian President that economic growth, business competitiveness, integrated development of regions and successful implementation of all social tasks directly depend on the development of roads.

Speaking at the meeting, Minnikhanov said that improvement and development of the road network is one of the main problems authorities at all levels face.

He said that currently 53 per cent of federal and 63 per cent of regional roads do not correspond to regulatory requirements, the number of cars increases by 6% each year while the number of roads put into operation remains the same. The situation is even worth with municipal roads.

Minnikhanov said that first of all it is necessary to double the volume of road construction. Also, the issue of optimization of construction and reconstruction cost is still open. According to him, it is necessary to make changes to requirements for the construction of roads with low traffic density, classification of road works, legitimize industrial regional standards in the pilot regions, create a modern database of innovative technologies and materials and introduce a system for qualification of designers.