Reforms, traffic on Sochi agenda

If you build it they will come, top businessmen said as Prime Minister Vladimir Putin issued a plea for more foreign investment to speed up Russia's exit from the crisis.

Speaking at an international economic forum in Sochi, the premier said he "appreciated" the $17 billion of foreign investment pumped into Russia in the first half of the year but the "economy is [still] totally underinvested."

The recent tragedy at the Sayano-Shushenskaya power plant in Siberia, which killed 75 people, gave another harsh reminder of Russia's creaking infrastructure last month. Sberbank president German Gref said new investment in green energy sources was needed.

Foreign firms looking to inject funds are often put off by the seemingly endless bureaucracy and corruption of business in Russia. The president of PricewaterhouseCoopers, Dennis Nelly, said the government needed to raise the transparency of procedures and decision making, RIA Novosti reported.

"Reduce traffic jams," joked the head of Baring Vostok Capital, Michael Calvey, referring both to hold ups in bureaucratic procedures and the obvious effect of Russia's lack of infrastructure.

Putin acknowledged the problems, promising to "streamline the banking sector and stock market" to make them more attractive to foreign investors.

"We will step up our efforts to get rid of the administrative barriers," he said. "Russia is open for foreign investment."

Meanwhile, Gref delivered a simple solution for Russian firms hoping to attract outside investment.

"If we work hard, they [investors] will come," he said, RIA Novosti reported.

The head of US conglomerate General Electric, Jeff Immelt, warned that to get the cash flooding in it would be necessary to create an equal footing for domestic and foreign firms.

Putin dismissed the requests from the participants for more access, saying that "nothing new or unusual had been asked for by either domestic or foreign firms."

"Foreign investors use a national treatment, for us there is no difference," Putin added, before reminding forum participants about the continued existence of US regulations that prohibited transfer of technology to the former Soviet Union.

The prime minister also delivered an attack on the US for their role in the financial crisis in yet another call for more regional reserve currencies.

"If the emission centre in Washington is printing money for the whole world and no one is controlling that, it poses a problem," Putin said.

Bankers were more concerned by his plans for lending rates to be reduced to 6 per cent, particularly when the Central Bank has the rate set at 10.5 per cent.

Gref said this would depend on the level of inflation and official interest rates, Reuters reported.

Elsewhere, oligarch Alexander Lebedev was already dangling the carrot for foreign investors, offering to give away shares for free. Before a disorderly queue developed, however, he laid down the sort of person he was looking for.

"If Warren Buffett agrees to take a 2 or 3 percent stake in my housing company free of charge for one rouble, that would bring me expertise," Lebedev said in an interview with Reuters earlier in the week.