State Duma wants to label foreign consulting firms as undesirable in Russia

The Russia-based foreign research companies studying commodity markets may be included in the list of organisations whose activities are undesirable on the territory of the Russian Federation.

Such amendments are proposed to the law "On the Basics of State Regulation of Trade Activities of the Russian Federation", Izvestia quotes Artem Kiryanov, deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee on Economic Policy, as saying.

The amendments suggest that structures such companies create to circumvent Russian laws will receive the status of foreign agents.

After the amendments have been adopted, the company will have to enter its details in the list of the Federal Antimonopoly Service. A special commission will decide on the ownership structure of a consulting firm. If the required information is not provided, shares in the authorized capital of such a structure may be forcibly sold by court order.

Kiryanov is convinced that Russia "needs analytics that we will independently process on our territory," while he called the collection of data by foreign research companies "espionage".

"Today, in the conditions of open information and economic confrontation with Western countries, it is important to prevent and eliminate threats of uncontrolled collection of data of Russian citizens, and in fact economic espionage conducted by Western research companies," he told.

He claims that foreign research companies have already consulted leading lawyers "and are looking for a loophole in the future law”. These companies have launched a process of "fake re-registration to formally comply with the proposed regulations." Artem Kiryanov named Nielsen, GFK, IQVIA and IPSOS among the companies trying to evade the future law.

Alexander Bashkin, a member of the Federation Council for Constitutional Legislation and State Building, called the measures being worked out compulsory. According to him, "there is information that such data is harmful to Russia." "This measure is not only forced but also temporary. Until the negative pressure on our country - economic, political, military - stops, we are forced to defend ourselves. This is a protective measure," he said.