Winners of All-Russian Award "Exporter of the Year" announced

13 November 2019

Source: https://www.exportcenter.ru/en/news/winners-of-all-russian-award-exporter-of-the-year-announced/

Andrey Slepnev, General Director, Russian Export Center (REC) announced winners of All-Russian Award "Exporter of the Year" at TASS press conference. Winners awarding ceremony will take place at "Made in Russia" forum to be held in Moscow on November 14.

Winners will be granted various bonuses from REC and the award partners. Some of them are: personal support of negotiations with foreign partners in foreign markets; bonus rates for export contract servicing; registration in foreign market place; acceleration program training in the School of Export in Moscow, as well as wide range of exporters information support measures.

Initially, it was assumed that about 1 thousand exporters will participate in the award. But eventually, applications from more than 1 thousand 600 companies were received. Among them, 70% are small business enterprises, 30% - large businesses. According to the number of applications filed, Tsentralny and Privolzhsky federal districts are the leaders.

Winners of "Exporter of the Year" award:

Volzhsky Pipe Plant (Volgograd region; steel pipes and as-cast billets) - exporter of the year, category: industry and large business;
TVEL (Moscow; nuclear fuel manufacturer) - exporter of the year, category: high tech, large business;
Nizhny Novgorod Oil-Fat Plant(Nizhny Novgorod region; margarine, mayonnaise, sauces, ketchup, emulsifiers for food industry) - exporter of the year, category: agribusiness industry, large business;
RZhD Logistics(Moscow; railway transportation) - exporter of the year, category: services, large business;
"Sodruzhestvo" Management Company (Kaliningrad region; animal feed and food product components of oil crop seeds), category: "New geography", large business;
"Potok Inter" Research and Production Company (Moscow; devices for air disinfection, destruction of all types of microorganisms and viruses) - exporter of the year, category: industry, SMEs;
Promobot (Perm region; presentation robots) - exporter of the year, category: high technology, SMEs;
Plodoimport(Moscow region; canned vegetables, "Uncle Vanya" brand) - exporter of the year, category: agriculture, SMEs;
IT Professional Solutions (Perm region; digital transformation services for large enterprises, based on advanced technologies: IIoT, Big Data/Smart Data) - exporter of the year, category: services, SMEs;
Neurosoft (Ivanovo region; equipment for neurophysiology, functional diagnostics, therapy, audiology and rehabilitation) - "Breakthrough of the Year", SME.

The award background

The "Best Russian Exporter" award was established in 1998. Since 2008, it has been granted under the auspices of the Ministry of Industry and Trade. In 2015, the new award format has been developed: its name was changed for "Exporter of the Year", as the principle criterion established for selection of participants among exporters, was non-resource exports.

In 2019, the All-Russian award "Exporter of the Year" was included in the list of measures of the national project "International Cooperation and Export".

The award has been held on competitive basis, and consists of two stages. Initially, winners were awarded at the level of 8 federal districts, then the best of them were determined in each category at the national level. Final winner awarding ceremony will be held in the framework of the International Export Forum "Made in Russia" on November 14.

Principles of participation

Exporters could complete a questionnaire on REC website, thus submitting their application for participation. Electronic questionnaires ensure the procedure simplicity and transparency. The questionnaires are ranked automatically. This, in turn, allows to avoid the impact of "human factor" during analysis of the participants' questionnaires. During the initial stage, the exporters were requested to provide a minimum document package, in order to get rid of "fake" exporters. Detailed verification is applied by the representatives of the constituent entities of the Federation in each nomination.

The questionnaire provided for assessment of export activities. Namely: scope of exports, share of exports in total revenue of a company. Exporters are being assessed, inter alia, by availability of mandatory documents confirming the implemented procedures of product conformity assessment, according to the foreign markets standards (such as certificates of conformity, declarations of conformity, inspection certificates, registration certificates).

Exporters received additional points if they were able to confirm availability of foreign trademarks. Another advantage was availability of product support services abroad, after-sales warranty service and sales offices. Plenty of attention was paid to export activities level (emergence of the new countries for exports, dynamics of growth in the number of foreign customers, export nomenclature expansion). Priority was also given to assessment of international promotion.