Foreign Investors Praise for Russian Business Environment Grows by 17% in 1 Year

The positive assessment of the Russian business environment by foreign investors grew from 6 percent in 2015 to 23 percent in this year's report, the survey by FleishmanHillard Vanguard and Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (RSPP) showed on Monday.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — The survey "Evaluation of Russia’s business environment" has been carried out since 2011.

"Foreign investors noted significant improvement of Russia’s business environment compared to the previous two years. The share of respondents who positively assess the dynamics of the Russian business environment increased almost fourfold – to 23% compared to 6% in 2015. At the same time, the share of the pessimistic estimates significantly decreased to 53%, compared to 77% in 2015 and 82% in 2014," General Director at FleishmanHillard Vanguard Elena Fadeeva was quoted as saying in the survey.

According to the survey, 82 percent of the respondents remarked on the negative influence of political instability in 2014, but that number decreased to 29 percent in 2015 and remained at that level in 2016.

"The most acute problems in the development of Russia’s business environment were noted as the lack of qualified personnel (47% in 2016, 49% in 2015, 27% in 2014), high administrative barriers (47% in 2016, 41% in 2015, 27% in 2014) and price increases (45% in 2016, 55% in 2015 and 2014)," the report said.

The survey also demonstrated the increased assessment of unfair competition as a major hurdle, with 29 percent of the respondents complaining about that, compared to 5 percent in 2015 and 9 percent in 2014.

International communications agency FleishmanHillard partnered with Moscow-based Vanguard in 2007. The joint venture specializes in corporate reputation management, marketing, government relations and public affairs.