Russian Gov't May Introduce New Measures To Boost Population Growth In 2019 - Official

The Russian government may introduce a new set of measures aimed at curbing poverty and stimulating population growth in 2019, Tatyana Golikova, Russian deputy prime minister for social policy, told Sputnik on Monday.

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 24th September, 2018) The Russian government may introduce a new set of measures aimed at curbing poverty and stimulating population growth in 2019, Tatyana Golikova, Russian deputy prime minister for social policy, told Sputnik on Monday.

"I'm not ruling out that we will take additional measures on demographic support, and, perhaps, on support for families with children," Golikova said, adding that the new set of measures would be announced only after the first quarter of 2019, since the government first needed to receive all of this year's data on the socioeconomic situation in Russia.

She also noted that halving the poverty level in Russia by 2024 was one of the most challenging tasks included in Russian President Vladimir Putin's decree on national goals, released in May,

"Even judging by the existing forecast, we see that if we do not take measures, we will be around 1.5 percent behind the desired level of poverty rate reduction. And we have to estimate how we can make up for these 1.

5 percent, by what measures," the official said.

Golikova went on to say that the government was going to study the structure of poverty in the country, including the new trends of 2018.

Asked about the possible sources for the implementation of the new measures, Golikova said that these could be "all kinds of sources," depending on the measures to be taken.

"We should analyze the situation very seriously," she said, adding that it was too early to go into detail about the measures.

During his annual "Direct Line" Q&A session on June 7, Putin said that he considered halving the number of people living below the national poverty line as a major goal for the government, along with increasing the birth rate in the country. According to Putin, the government should develop measures that would motivate mothers to have more children, in particular, by introducing changes to the maternity fund system. For example, a part of the maternity fund could be distributed to families in order to help them satisfy their daily needs.