Webinar on Supporting enterprises for rapid economic recovery: timely responses and the case of the Russian Federation
ILO Moscow Office has organized the third out of five webinars under a general title “From the immediate crisis response to COVID pandemic towards economic recovery, with decent work in focus”. The participants discussed country responses to support enterprises for rapid economic recovery, especially for employment retention in micro- and small enterprises, support to self-entrepreneurs and dismissed workers.
The webinar was attended by over 80 representatives of Labour Ministries, workers and employers organizations, other line ministries and agencies, including Public Employment Services (PES), research community and UN agencies from 10 countries served by ILO Moscow Office
Dragan Radic, Head of the SME Unit, ILO Headquarters in Geneva, described the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on MSMEs and reviewed the world-wide lessons learnt from country responses, He stressed that policies and programmes need to be timely adapted to the different stages of the COVID-19 economic crisis. Firstly, these are immediate measures to mitigate the initial impact on business and job losses; secondly, measures for economic reactivation, and the final phase supporting economic recovery and rebuilding.
Fedor Prokopov, ILO expert, spoke about Russia’s experience on supporting jobs and employment for rapid economic recovery. He provided practical examples of policy measures protecting simultaneously small businesses and jobs. For instance interest-free loans to support employment, agreements concluded on deferral of lease or tax payments, and loans rescheduling for small businesses. As immediate response, Russia successfully provided tax breaks for 1.6 million companies employing 3.2 million workers; tax relief for 3.5 million own-account workers, and 2019 tax return on business incomes for over 330 thousand self-employed people.
Mr. Prokopov highlighted that supporting unemployed people was a critically important priority at early stage of the COVID-19 crisis. Finally he remarked the importance of better coordination between employment support and social programmes.
ILO Moscow specialists Mikhail Pouchkin, Vlado Curovic and Gocha Aleksandria presented policy measures and good practices consistent with the provisions of international labour standards. They gave practical examples of how employers’ and workers’ organizations can engage in aconstructive dialogue with the government aiming to avoid enterprises failures and job losses.
The presentations were followed by Q&A session. The event was organized in the framework of the project “Partnerships for Youth Employment in the CIS” being implemented in partnership with the Russian company LUKOIL.
Dragan Radic, Head of the SME Unit, ILO Headquarters in Geneva, described the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on MSMEs and reviewed the world-wide lessons learnt from country responses, He stressed that policies and programmes need to be timely adapted to the different stages of the COVID-19 economic crisis. Firstly, these are immediate measures to mitigate the initial impact on business and job losses; secondly, measures for economic reactivation, and the final phase supporting economic recovery and rebuilding.
Fedor Prokopov, ILO expert, spoke about Russia’s experience on supporting jobs and employment for rapid economic recovery. He provided practical examples of policy measures protecting simultaneously small businesses and jobs. For instance interest-free loans to support employment, agreements concluded on deferral of lease or tax payments, and loans rescheduling for small businesses. As immediate response, Russia successfully provided tax breaks for 1.6 million companies employing 3.2 million workers; tax relief for 3.5 million own-account workers, and 2019 tax return on business incomes for over 330 thousand self-employed people.
Mr. Prokopov highlighted that supporting unemployed people was a critically important priority at early stage of the COVID-19 crisis. Finally he remarked the importance of better coordination between employment support and social programmes.
ILO Moscow specialists Mikhail Pouchkin, Vlado Curovic and Gocha Aleksandria presented policy measures and good practices consistent with the provisions of international labour standards. They gave practical examples of how employers’ and workers’ organizations can engage in aconstructive dialogue with the government aiming to avoid enterprises failures and job losses.
The presentations were followed by Q&A session. The event was organized in the framework of the project “Partnerships for Youth Employment in the CIS” being implemented in partnership with the Russian company LUKOIL.