MOSCOW, October 21 (RIA Novosti) - The Russian government may introduce measures to oblige companies to invest in energy efficiency and other technology projects, a Kremlin aide said on Wednesday.
"Russia must see a many-fold increase in investment in modern energy, including nuclear power engineering, and technologies relating to better energy efficiency, and also in telecommunications," Arkady Dvorkovich told an annual conference sponsored by UBS.
Dvorkovich said the government will do everything possible to ensure that investment in these areas starts to rise over the coming months, and will provide support for investors.
However, "In some cases, obligatory measures will have to be used," he said.
Russia, whose economy depends heavily on revenue from the sale of raw material commodities - mainly oil and gas - has so far failed to diversify its economy and create competitive value-added and high-technology industries.
Dvorkovich agreed with the view of other speakers at the conference that higher production efficiency, in particular labor productivity, will be long-term factors for the economy's growth.
"This will help us diversify the economy more quickly," he said.
