Niko Vardapetyan, the managing director for natural resources at the Russia-backed Eurasian Development Bank, tells Jacopo Dettoni how the bank is plugging the financing gap caused by Western sanctions, and the bank's plans to make Eurasian economies closer and more diversified.

Ulmart – Russia's equivalent of Amazon – is dominant in its home market, where it is active in more than 240 cities. And through its digital strategy, which among other innovations sees it accept payment in Bitcoin, the company looks set to stay ahead of the international field.

Sergey Cheremin, minister in charge of international economic relations for the city of Moscow, is upbeat despite Western sanctions. The Russian capital is focusing on high-tech industries as part of a massive long-term redevelopment scheme, he tells Courtney Fingar. 

Vladivostok in the Russian Far East lies more than eight hours away from Moscow by plane. However, it does sit within close proximity to key global economies such as China, Japan and South Korea, which is behind Vladimir Putin's drive to make the resource-rich region a centre of Russian social and economic development. Courtney Fingar reports.

Russian minister of industry and trade Denis Manturov talks to fDi at the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok.

Faced with low oil revenues and sanctions against Russia, Tatarstan president Rustam Minnikhanov tells Courtney Fingar how he is promoting R&D, while diversifying the country’s economy away from its traditional industrial base and into Islamic finance.