On April 24-25, 2007, the World Bank with the financial support of DFID and in cooperation with the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Regional Development, the Ministry of Health and Social Development and the regional administrations of Kalmykiya, Karachayevo-Cherkessiya, Tatarstan, Tomsk, and Tver, will conduct the National Conference to present and discuss a National Report based on a one-year study of income-tested social assistance programs in five regions of Russian Federation.  The study was conducted by the Consortium of Russian and international firms: The Institute for Urban Economics (Moscow), The Independent Institute of Social Policy (Moscow) and the Urban Institute (Washington DC).

The study confirms that the performance of income-tested programs – child allowances, housing allowances and/or regional programs aimed explicitly at the poor – continues to be mediocre, with over two thirds of the spent funds leaking to the non-poor beneficiaries. The inability of the social assistance programs to channel their resources on poor beneficiaries erodes their impact on reducing the poverty.  The World Bank will present a proposal of a pilot project aimed to improve the targeting accuracy of these programs and hence, accelerate poverty reduction in the short term, through the cooperation between the Federal Government, several regions and the World Bank.

The Conference will be attended by the leadership of regional government and administration from all five regions, heads of the regional social protection and employment services. The federal authorities will be represented by the high officials (Deputy Ministers and Department heads) of Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Economic Development and Trade, Ministry of Regional Development, the Ministry of Health and Social Development, heads of the Committee on labor and social policy of State Duma, Administration of the President and the Government Apparatus. The Department for International Development (United Kingdom) will be represented by the head of the office in Russia, the World Bank will be represented by the Director for Human Development, ECA Region, Mrs. Manuelyan Atinc, and the Country Director for the Russian Federation Mr. Klaus Rohland.