Medvedev regards setting up aircraft construction centre top priority

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev regards the establishment of an aircraft construction centre in Russia a top priority, not an amusement. The premier expressed this view, addressing the plenary meeting of the International Aviation Congress on Tuesday. “The establishment of a large aircraft construction complex is really not an amusement but a matter of priority importance for various reasons, including geographic,” the premier stressed. “Ours is a large country, spreading over nine time zones, and the task is to provide excellent contemporary transport for its citizens and maintain the common transport space over the entire territory of a very large country,” he said. Medvedev recalled that the city of Zhukovsky, named after the founder of aerodynamics, had become the place where the idea of integration of science and production originated and was implemented. “It is not accidental that the National Centre of Aircraft Construction is being established here to combine everything needed for the development of promising models, from designing to creating test samples,” Medvedev said, noting that it is intended to establish a veritable production cluster of a world standard for aircraft designing and testing with the required production, training and social infrastructure. The premier has said that there are plans to set up a large research centre on the base of the Central Institute of Aerohydrodynamics (TsAGI) to include the leading research institutes of the aircraft industry. The premier pointed out that the government meeting on Tuesday adopted the new wording of the country’s Transport Strategy. He said, “The authorities want the country’s ‘transport advantage to be used more effectively.”