Russia's Far East was the only region within the entire federation that registered annual economic growth in 2009.
The region recorded year-on-year industrial growth of 2.66 percent, and a 14-percent surge in residents' actual income.
The region was expected to maintain steady growth in 2010, due to a regional development strategy the Russian government recently laid out, and three new industrial projects in the Primorye Territory.
During a late December visit to the region, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin announced the layout of a development strategy for the Far East and Baikal regions. The ultimate aim of the strategy, designed to be implemented through 2025, was to guarantee sustained economic development and a comfortable living environment for the region's residents.
Putin said the strategy defines the future needs for the regions including the Far East, Irkutsk, Buryat and Transbaikal territory.
The prime minister also pledged additional support for economic development of the Primorye Territory, whose regional capital of Vladivostok
was set to hold the 2012 summit of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation.
Meanwhile, three strategic projects, including a Pacific oil pipeline, a drilling rig and an auto plant have been launched in the Far East.
The first section of the Eastern Siberia-Pacific Ocean (ESPO) pipeline was officially activated on Dec. 28, 2009, at the port of Kozmino near Vladivostok.
The pipeline was designed to carry up to a daily 1.6 million barrels of crude oil from Siberia to the Far East and then the Asia-Pacific region.
Putin who attended the acitvation ceremony, said the project would inject new impetus to Far Eastern and Siberian development with modernized
technologies.
A semi-submersible drilling rig at the Zvezda ship-building plant was launched on the same day as the pipeline in the town of Bolshoi Kamen. With the involvement of foreign companies, the plant was to produce civilian vessels including tankers. The total volume of investments was expected to be about 400 million U.S. dollars.
The Sollers auto plant, which will produce Korean SsangYong SUVs, Japanese Isuzu trucks and vehicles for special use with Fiat Ducato chassis
was also unveiled in Vladivostok.
The assembly project was expected to initially produce 15,000 vehicles a year, while expanding production to 40,000 units by 2012.
In addition, construction of the ESPO second section was to continue this year. Three oil and gas fields along the continental shelf of Sakhalin, including Odoptu, Chayvo and Al-Kutun Dargyal, were to be explored. An underwater railway tunnel in Khabarovsk was also to undergo renovations.