New national projects: a look to the future

The list of national projects of the "second wave" approved by the Government of the Russian Federation is quite wide and covers a variety of areas of development in the country’s socio-economic complex. National projects 2019-2024 were developed in three main areas ("Human Capital", "Comfortable Living Environment", and "Economic Growth") and approved by the Decree of the President of the Russian Federation "On national goals and strategic objectives of the development of the Russian Federation until 2024". Officially, the program of national projects was launched in 2019 for the period until 2024, but in July 2020, it was decided to postpone the achievement of a number of indicators until 2030 and adjust the program taking into account changed circumstances, which affected not only the composition and structure of existing national projects but also led to the development of four new projects aimed at developing tourism, nuclear energy, cybersecuritysystems, and unmanned aircraft. An important task in the implementation of national projects is to achieve a clear relationship between the amount of funding and the planned result. This requires a system of indicators that is not yet sufficiently developed, and many indicators do not have approved calculation methods and are not included in the federal statistical work plan. The main problems in the implementation of national projects are the result of the unpreparedness of management personnel at all levels to work on projects of great social importance under conditions of limited budget and time. A culture of project management has not yet been formed, and an atmosphere of intolerance towards the managerial illiteracy of direct executors, including managers, has not been created. Meanwhile, for the successful implementation of priority national projects implemented until 2024, it is necessary to take into account the experience accumulated to date, which can largely be considered positive.