At a meeting to discuss national development goals, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said that the growth of the Russian economy does meet the expectations, finanz.ru reports.

"At the end of last year, the gross domestic product grew not much more than 2%. At the beginning of this year, the dynamics are even worse," Medvedev said.

According to the Russian Federal State Statistics Service (Rosstat), in the first quarter, the economy gained only 0.5% and fell by 0.4% comparing to the fourth quarter. Incomes of the population continued to decline (by 2.3% in January-March), by May, all industrial sectors, except oil and gas, fell into recession.

"Of course, there are reasons for this. Some of them are the instability of markets, the slowdown of the global economy, the prudence of investors, low consumer demand, sanctions, trade wars that are unfolding," said Russian Prime Minister.

"These risks should be considered but not used to justify why we do not have the necessary changes. We need to prepare adequate measures to reduce these risks," Medvedev said.

"We need extra measures to "warm up the economy" in the remaining months of the year. Russian economy should achieve a higher pace of development than the global average and secure its position among the five largest economies," said the Prime Minister.

"We need to significantly increase labor productivity and business activity, increase non-resource exports, including exports of machinery, equipment, and agricultural products. These tasks are challenging, especially in the current situation," Medvedev said.

Russian Minister for Economic Development Maxim Oreshkin after the meeting with Medvedev wrote on his Instagram page that "10 key changes have been outlined to increase the pace of economic growth."

He did not specify which measures are planned to be taken. According to Oreshkin, details will be published "in a few months."

  Russia, Medvedev

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