As Vladimir Putin spoke to a crowd in early February attending the “Everything for Victory” forum in Tula, a city 180 kilometres south of Moscow, he joked that he wanted to give the sanction-imposing West a “well-known gesture,” but wouldn’t because there were “a lot of girls” in the audience, and implied it would be rude.
Instead, the Russian president boasted about the country’s economy, and its ability to ramp up its military industrial complex, in the face of unprecedented sanctions.
“They predicted a recession, failure, collapse,” he told the crowd, which included factory employees, on Feb. 2.
“The entire economy has demonstrated resilience.”
Putin doesn’t need to campaign on the strength of Russia’s finances — he’s slated to be re-elected next week for his fifth term as president, because his serious challengers have been barred or prevented from running.
But he has happily pointed out that Russia’s economy is expected to grow 2.6 per cent this year, outpacing the G7, according to the International Monetary Fund.
WATCH | How Russian arms companies get past sanctions:
Ukrainian officer explains how Russia gets around sanctions
15 days ago
Duration 1:09
Serpen, an alias for a high-ranking Ukrainian soldier, explains how Russian arms companies use proxy companies to bypass Western sanctions.
Over the past two years, Russia’s government has managed to steer through sanctions and limit inflation, while investing nearly a third of its budget in defence spending.
It’s also been able to increase trade with China and sell its oil to new markets, in part by using a shadow fleet of tankers to skirt a price cap that Western countries had hoped would reduce the country’s war chest.
“I think for the next 12 to 18 months, [Putin] has enough resources … to continue to fulfil his war machine,” said Alexandra Prokopenko, a former adviser with Russia’s Central Bank.
Alexandra Prokopenko previously worked as an adviser at Russia’s central bank, but left the country in the early days of the invasion. She is now based in Berlin. (submitted/Alexandra Prokopenko )
Prokopenko is now based in Berlin, having left her job and the country in the initial days of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which began in February 2022.
“There is a big debate here in Europe: What was done wrong, and what else can we do to fine-tune the sanction regime?”
Economic resilience
After Russia launched its invasion, the ruble tumbled and Western countries blocked transactions with its central bank, freezing $300 billion US in sovereign assets.
Additional sanctions have been introduced in the subsequent years: more than 16,000 since Feb. 24, 2022, according to U.S.-based Castellum.AI. Some impact the economy more than others — over 11,000 of them are aimed at individuals, and about 4,600 at entities including financial institutions. A few hundreds others are directed at ships and aircraft.
European airspace also closed to Russian planes, and hundreds of Western companies pulled out of Russia or curtailed their operations there.
But today, the latest iPhones and MacBooks are on Russia’s shelves, because the government and its businesses have been mostly able to adapt.
A customer walks past a store that sells Apple products in Moscow in March 2022. (AFP via Getty Images)
Prokopenko calls Russia’s senior central bank officials Putin’s “generals” because the president has relied on their financial leadership while navigating what she calls an “impossible tri-lemma”: funding the war, maintaining business as usual and creating macroeconomic stability.
She said the bank’s decision at the start of the war to hike its key interest rate to 20 per cent and introduce capital controls helped stabilize the ruble.
In 2023, surging food prices became a political issue in Russia, especially the price of eggs, which rose by more than 40 per cent last year, and led to shortages in some areas.
The government has since scrambled to boost the egg supply by scrapping import duties and sourcing more imports from “friendly countries.”
A woman shops for vegetables at a market in Moscow in October 2023. Rising food prices have become a political issue in Russia. (Natalia Kolesnikova/AFP via Getty Images)
“Truth be told, the prices are rising and rising, but I think it is a normal situation for all countries nowadays,” says Marina Lubanovskaya, a Moscow-based travel agent who runs a YouTube channel called Made in Russland.
Although she says eggs are now about 20 per cent more expensive in Moscow, she’s taken videos of grocery stores across Russia in a point to dispel what she calls the “rumours” circulating in Western countries.
More than 15 million people live below the poverty line, according official statistics, but she says the sanctions haven’t been crippling.
“We live with abundance.”
Her videos show full shelves at grocery stores, and an alcohol section with wine from Italy and Crimea, the latter of which Russia illegally annexed in 2014.
She admits she’s had to pivot her travel business to new markets. She previously booked trips for her Russian clients to Europe, but is now booking them to Asia.
Tilt toward China
Russia has relied on Asia, and specifically China, as a major economic lifeline.
Half of its oil and petroleum was exported to China in 2023, Russian officials say. And it became China’s top oil supplier in 2023, according to Chinese customs data.
Putin shakes hands with Chinese President Xi Jinping during a meeting at the Belt and Road Forum in Beijing in October 2023. The two countries have deepened their ties since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine began. (via REUTERS)
Chinese imports have jumped more than 60 per cent since the start of war, as the country has been able to supply Russia with a steady stream of goods including cars and electronic devices.
Trade between the two countries hit $240 billion US in 2023, an increase of over 64 per cent since 2021, before the war.
Exodus of workers
While Russia has turned to new customers abroad, at home it’s facing a labour shortage of nearly five million workers in 2023, according to its media reports.
The country’s record-low unemployment rate meant there were “practically no workers left,” central bank governor Elvira Nabiullina told lawmakers in November.
“For further growth of the Russian economy, increased labour productivity is needed.”
WATCH | Despite sanctions, Western parts are still used in Russian weapons:
Hackers expose how Russia skirts sanctions for its weapons
7 days ago
Duration 9:33
Despite tight sanctions, Western parts are being used in Russia’s battlefield weapons. CBC’s Ben Makuch meets with Ukrainian hackers who reveal that one arms maker is after Canadian technology and how a complex web of intermediaries make it possible.
Contributing to the shortage are the hundreds of thousands of people who left after the invasion began.
Araz Mamet, a U.S. citizen who was working in Moscow in March 2022, decided to leave the country along with his small team of tech workers. He set up shop at a shared workspace in Baku, the capital of nearby Azerbaijan.
New Zeon is a co-working space in Baku, Azerbaijan. (CBC News)
After a partial mobilization announcement in late 2022, he helped secure a private jet to offer others a chance to get out of Russia by booking a seat for $2,500 US.
Around 300 or 400 people asked for help. They had to cap it at 110 people, who left Russia in two separate private flights. Hundreds of others made it out to Baku on their own.
While some have since returned to Russia or moved on to other countries, a few hundred remain working out of the shared space for now.
“I believe if the situation in Russia will change, certainly the majority will go back, because they still have their properties, families and relatives,” he said.
Boosting military production
The labour shortage is particularly acute as the country ramps up military production, with some factories working around the clock in multiple shifts.
Businesses are also being re-purposed to fulfil lucrative state contracts.
According to Russian media, a bakery south of Moscow turned part of its floor space into a drone production facility.
Three malls in the city of Izhevsk, which lies 1,000 kilometres east of Moscow and is already home to weapon maker Kalashnikov, have been taken over by drone manufacturers.
Military vehicles are pictured at a plant, which is part of Russian missile manufacturer Almaz-Antey, in Saint Petersburg in January 2023. (SPUTNIK/AFP via Getty Images)
Russia’s ability to keep churning out weaponry and using its oil money to finance it is a pressing problem for Ukraine, which is grappling with a weapons and ammunition shortage, as well as its allies.
But there are no easy steps left when it comes to tightening the sanction regime, Prokopenko says.
“It’s a mouse and cat game.
“Any delays in terms of taking decisions about additional sanctions gives Russia the opportunity to adjust its policy and its economy.”
Almost seven years since news broke of an alleged conspiracy to fix the price of packaged bread across Canada, the saga isn’t over: the Competition Bureau continues to investigate the companies that may have been involved, and two class-action lawsuits continue to work their way through the courts.
Here’s a timeline of key events in the bread price-fixing case.
Oct. 31, 2017: The Competition Bureau says it’s investigating allegations of bread price-fixing and that it was granted search warrants in the case. Several grocers confirm they are co-operating in the probe.
Dec. 19, 2017: Loblaw and George Weston say they participated in an “industry-wide price-fixing arrangement” to raise the price of packaged bread. The companies say they have been co-operating in the Competition Bureau’s investigation since March 2015, when they self-reported to the bureau upon discovering anti-competitive behaviour, and are receiving immunity from prosecution. They announce they are offering $25 gift cards to customers amid the ongoing investigation into alleged bread price-fixing.
Jan. 31, 2018: In court documents, the Competition Bureau says at least $1.50 was added to the price of a loaf of bread between about 2001 and 2016.
Dec. 20, 2019: A class-action lawsuit in a Quebec court against multiple grocers and food companies is certified against a number of companies allegedly involved in bread price-fixing, including Loblaw, George Weston, Metro, Sobeys, Walmart Canada, Canada Bread and Giant Tiger (which have all denied involvement, except for Loblaw and George Weston, which later settled with the plaintiffs).
Dec. 31, 2021: A class-action lawsuit in an Ontario court covering all Canadian residents except those in Quebec who bought packaged bread from a company named in the suit is certified against roughly the same group of companies.
June 21, 2023: Bakery giant Canada Bread Co. is fined $50 million after pleading guilty to four counts of price-fixing under the Competition Act as part of the Competition Bureau’s ongoing investigation.
Oct. 25 2023: Canada Bread files a statement of defence in the Ontario class action denying participating in the alleged conspiracy and saying any anti-competitive behaviour it participated in was at the direction and to the benefit of its then-majority owner Maple Leaf Foods, which is not a defendant in the case (neither is its current owner Grupo Bimbo). Maple Leaf calls Canada Bread’s accusations “baseless.”
Dec. 20, 2023: Metro files new documents in the Ontario class action accusing Loblaw and its parent company George Weston of conspiring to implicate it in the alleged scheme, denying involvement. Sobeys has made a similar claim. The two companies deny the allegations.
July 25, 2024: Loblaw and George Weston say they agreed to pay a combined $500 million to settle both the Ontario and Quebec class-action lawsuits. Loblaw’s share of the settlement includes a $96-million credit for the gift cards it gave out years earlier.
Sept. 12, 2024: Canada Bread files new documents in Ontario court as part of the class action, claiming Maple Leaf used it as a “shield” to avoid liability in the alleged scheme. Maple Leaf was a majority shareholder of Canada Bread until 2014, and the company claims it’s liable for any price-fixing activity. Maple Leaf refutes the claims.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 19, 2024.
Companies in this story: (TSX:L, TSX:MFI, TSX:MRU, TSX:EMP.A, TSX:WN)
TORONTO – Canada’s main stock index was up more than 250 points in late-morning trading, led by strength in the base metal and technology sectors, while U.S. stock markets also charged higher.
The S&P/TSX composite index was up 254.62 points at 23,847.22.
In New York, the Dow Jones industrial average was up 432.77 points at 41,935.87. The S&P 500 index was up 96.38 points at 5,714.64, while the Nasdaq composite was up 486.12 points at 18,059.42.
The Canadian dollar traded for 73.68 cents US compared with 73.58 cents US on Thursday.
The November crude oil contract was up 89 cents at US$70.77 per barrel and the October natural gas contract was down a penny at US2.27 per mmBTU.
The December gold contract was up US$9.40 at US$2,608.00 an ounce and the December copper contract was up four cents at US$4.33 a pound.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 19, 2024.
VANCOUVER – Supervised injection sites are saving the lives of drug users everyday, but the same support is not being offered to people who inhale illicit drugs, the head of the BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS says.
Dr. Julio Montaner said the construction of Vancouver’s first indoor supervised site for people who inhale drugs comes as the percentage of people who die from smoking drugs continues to climb.
The location in the Downtown Eastside at the Hope to Health Research and Innovation Centre was unveiled Wednesday after construction was complete, and Montaner said people could start using the specialized rooms in a matter of weeks after final approvals from the city and federal government.
“If we don’t create mechanisms for these individuals to be able to use safely and engage with the medical system, and generate points of entry into the medical system, we will never be able to solve the problem,” he said.
“Now, I’m not here to tell you that we will fix it tomorrow, but denying it or ignoring it, or throw it under the bus, or under the carpet is no way to fix it, so we need to take proactive action.”
Nearly two-thirds of overdose deaths in British Columbia in 2023 came after smoking illicit drugs, yet only 40 per cent of supervised consumption sites in the province offer a safe place to smoke, often outdoors, in a tent.
The centre has been running a supervised injection site for years which sees more than a thousand people monthly and last month resuscitated five people who were overdosing.
The new facilities offer indoor, individual, negative-pressure rooms that allow fresh air to circulate and can clear out smoke in 30 to 60 seconds while users are monitored by trained nurses.
Advocates calling for more supervised inhalation sites have previously said the rules for setting up sites are overly complicated at a time when the province is facing an overdose crisis.
More than 15,000 people have died of overdoses since the public health emergency was declared in B.C. in April 2016.
Kate Salters, a senior researcher at the centre, said they worked with mechanical and chemical engineers to make sure the site is up to code and abidies by the highest standard of occupational health and safety.
“This is just another tool in our tool box to make sure that we’re offering life-saving services to those who are using drugs,” she said.
Montaner acknowledged the process to get the site up and running took “an inordinate amount of time,” but said the centre worked hard to follow all regulations.
“We feel that doing this right, with appropriate scientific background, in a medically supervised environment, etc, etc, allows us to derive the data that ultimately will be sufficiently convincing for not just our leaders, but also the leaders across the country and across the world, to embrace the strategies that we are trying to develop.” he said.
Montaner said building the facility was possible thanks to a single $4-million donation from a longtime supporter.
Construction finished with less than a week before the launch of the next provincial election campaign and within a year of the next federal election.
Montaner said he is concerned about “some of the things that have been said publicly by some of the political leaders in the province and in the country.”
“We want to bring awareness to the people that this is a serious undertaking. This is a very massive investment, and we need to protect it for the benefit of people who are unfortunately drug dependent.” he said.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 18, 2024.
