Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev says he recognizes the problems holding back the country's economy. Sadly, nobody has much confidence in his plans to address them.
With the country's rate of economic growth declining toward zero, Medvedev is making a renewed effort to show the business community that he knows what to do. In an unusually long articlepublished in the business daily Vedomosti, he acknowledged that what growth the country has is largely artificial, that the government is too dependent on revenue from the oil industry, and that Russia offers a terrible environment for investment.
