OREANDA-NEWS  By 2030, under the current socio-demographic model, the personnel deficit in Russia will reach 3.1 million people. This was stated by Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak at the forum on improving labor productivity in Krasnoyarsk, Interfax reports.

According to him, the issue of labor remains one of the main constraints on economic growth: in fact, because of it, the country has approached the structural limit. In five years, due to the retirement of workers, Russia needs to replace 11 million jobs, without which it will not be possible to achieve a sustainable increase in GDP.

At the same time, the official expressed the hope that the existing and newly launched labor productivity improvement programs will be able to almost completely close the gap and compensate for the shortage of three million workers by the end of the decade.

"This is not just a tool to increase the efficiency of individual enterprises, it is, in fact, a managerial response to the main structural gap in the Russian economy," Novak stressed. On average, over the past five years, labor productivity in Russia has increased by 1.4 percent per year, which can be considered high rates.

Referring to the decline in economic growth, the Deputy Prime Minister recalled that since 2023, GDP has grown by more than ten percent, so the recession of last and current years reflects the transition from a recovery phase to balanced growth. According to the updated macroeconomic forecast from the Ministry of Economic Development, in 2026 the economy will grow by 0.4 percent, then by 1.4 and 2.4 percent, respectively, which is lower than the global average.

Earlier, the head of the department, Maxim Reshetnikov, explained that it would be difficult to ensure the growth of the Russian economy without using migrants, and some kind of importation of the able-bodied population was necessary. He called raising the overtime limit for Russians another way to cope with the personnel shortage. The State Duma has already passed the relevant bill.