Russian employers are awaiting labor migrants

The need for workers on construction sites in Russia is 1–1.5 million people, so developers have long awaited concrete steps to address the shortage of labor migrants.

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The recent specifics regarding the opening of borders for labor migrants is undoubtedly a positive development; the market has long awaited practical steps to attract people to construction sites and eliminate the labor shortage, said Alexander Ruchyev, president of the GC “Osnova,” to the newspaper “Izvestia“.

Earlier, it was reported that the Russian government adopted a resolution on a pilot project for the import of labor migrants from Uzbekistan for work in construction. According to the document, the maximum number of foreign citizens within the project will be 10,000 people.

“I hope that 10,000 labor migrants is just the first stage, because the overall need for workers on construction sites in Russia is estimated to be between 1 million and 1.5 million people, and it is increasing,” said Alexander Ruchyev.

The head of the new construction center of the federal company “Etazhi,” Sergey Zaitsev, noted that the shortage of labor migrants also affects the individual housing construction market.

“It is important to create the simplest mechanism possible that will allow the market to be filled with labor resources as quickly and efficiently as possible,” he is confident. “Any strict restrictions on the admission of migrants may create additional barriers, which ultimately will increase the cost of such resources and may negatively affect the price of apartments for the end consumer,” added Sergey Zaitsev.

While these experts expressed concern about the labor shortage in Russia, another Russian expert previously complained about the low wages of Russians and suggested reducing quotas for attracting foreign workers by three to four times to increase wages.