VEB.RF and the National PPP Development Centre have signed cooperation agreements with leading expert organisations such as KPMG, Expert RA and ACRA to jointly implement the best international infrastructure practices in Russia, including the Principles for Quality Infrastructure Investment approved by the G20 countries.
The purpose of the cooperation is to develop the infrastructure market in the Russian Federation, improve the quality and sustainability of infrastructure projects, as well as to ensure their efficiency and investment attractiveness.
The parties to the agreements intend to join the work on creating the National Infrastructure Project Assessment and Certification System, which is being implemented by VEB.RF together with the National PPP Development Centre and AECOM on the initiative of the Russian Ministry of Finance. The Russian National Infrastructure Project Assessment and Certification System, which meets the best international practices and takes into account the requirements of foreign investors, will help increase the number of quality infrastructure projects and attract private Russian and foreign investments in infrastructure projects. The partnership involves joint development of approaches to create a system for evaluating and certifying infrastructure projects, developing a methodology for selecting and assessing the quality of infrastructure projects, developing requirements for verifiers, as well as implementing joint research and educational activities.
“One of the key tasks that will contribute to the growth of the country's economy in the long term is the development of infrastructure. Essentially, the system of assessment and certification that is being created sets the main quality guidelines for infrastructure projects, which will ensure their attractiveness in Russia and abroad and contribute to its faster and more efficient implementation. Partnership with leading expert organisations, such as KPMG, Expert RA and ACRA, will allow us to take into account their experience and their groundwork in project financing, risk management, and investment evaluation and rating,” said VEB.RF’s Deputy Chairperson and Member of the Management Board Svetlana Yachevskaya.
“In practice, we regularly see delays in the implementation or even freezing of both large federal and small regional infrastructure projects. Often, the reason is the low quality of development of initiatives, which subsequently affects the project throughout its life cycle on all stages. We hope that in working together with the parties to the agreements we would be able to create a working tool for the assessment and certification, which would allow, at an early stage, to guide projects in the right direction, in order to achieve infrastructure facilities that would be effective for the state and in great demand for the public,” the National PPP Centre CEO Pavel Seleznyov emphasised.