[PEN-L:607] Russia: Poverty, Contraction, IMF

[Gregory Schwartz <grishas@xxxxxxxx>]

Here is the latest (horrifying) news from Russia.

Greg.

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RFE/RL NEWSLINE Vol 2, No. 203, Part I, 20 October 1998
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MORE RUSSIANS FALLING INTO POVERTY... More Russians
slipped into poverty in September compared with August,
Interfax reported on 19 October. Last month, the amount
of the population living in poverty reached more than
one-third. Real incomes plunged 12.4 percent during the
first nine months of the year, compared with the same
period in 1997, while consumer prices swelled 38.4
percent in September alone--the biggest monthly rise in
three years. Nationwide, the number of unemployed
increased by 0.5 percent, while the rate of unemployment
as of 1 October was estimated at 11.5 percent.
"Segodnya" reported on 17 October that the number of
jobless in Moscow rose 10 percent from mid-September to
mid-October. JAC

....AS ECONOMIC CONTRACTION ACCELERATES. Russian gross
domestic product shrank 9.9 percent in September,
following an 8.2 percent drop in August, Interfax
reported on 19 October. The State Statistics Committee
called it the largest economic drop since 1994.
Industrial output dropped 14.5 percent in September;
automobile production was particularly hard hit,
sustaining a 35 percent decline. Among the nation's
export industries, fuel dropped 4.6 percent, iron,
steel, and non-ferrous metals fell 16 percent, and
logging, timber, pulp, and paper industries 6.4 percent.
First Deputy Prime Minister Yurii Maslyukov told a
conference of defense industry executives that the
nation's natural monopolies could be used to pull the
Russian economy out of its crisis. According to
Interfax, he added that "the lending potential of the
Central Bank should be better used for export industries
and for the construction of houses and roads." JAC

IMF OFFERS FOOD, NOT CASH. The IMF mission arrived in
Moscow on 20 October--one day after IMF Managing
Director Michel Camdessus declared that his agency is
unlikely to provide any new money soon, calling on the
West to provide Russia with humanitarian assistance to
avert hunger. "Kommersant-Daily" dubbed the offer of
humanitarian assistance "Camdessus's legs," a reference
to "Bush's legs," or the U.S. poultry imports,
especially chicken legs, that flooded the Russian market
as food aid during President George Bush's
administration. The newspaper noted that the IMF is
waiting for the government to present its economic plan,
but "all last week Maslyukov and other government
officials said that the emergency budget for the fourth
quarter was not yet ready." The newspaper also reported
that Karelia and other raions in Leningrad Oblast have
already received humanitarian assistance from
Scandinavian countries. JAC

--
Gregory Schwartz
Department of Political Science
York University
4700 Keele St.
Toronto, Ontario
M3J 1P3
Canada

Tel:  (416) 736-5265
Fax:  (416) 736-5686
Mail: grishas@xxxxxxxx
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