On November 30, the first meeting of the Council on Strategic Projects under the President of the Republic of Belarus was held in the NAS of Belarus.

The meeting was attended by Alexander Kosinets, Assistant to the President of the Republic of Belarus, Viktor Karankevich, Minister of Energy, Sergey Shlychkov, Chairman of the State Committee on Science and Technology, Nadezhda Lazarevich, First Deputy Chairman of the Minsk City Council, Stanislav Narkevich, Deputy Chairman of the State Control Committee, and other heads of ministries, departments, and industries.

At the first meeting of the Council on Strategic Projects under the President of the Republic of Belarus, three issues were discussed: the working procedure of the Council on Strategic Projects, criteria for strategic projects and the assigning specific objects to them, as well as the organization of ensuring the effective work of the Council on Strategic Projects.

Opening the meeting, Chairman of the Council on Strategic Projects under the President of the Republic of Belarus Vladimir Gusakov stressed the importance of the task assigned to the Council by the Head of State. "In my opinion, the main mission of the Council is to ensure the unconditional implementation of the decisions of the President of the Republic of Belarus on the implementation of major projects that determine the future of the country (such as the Belarusian NPP, BNBC, electric transport and a number of others), as well as to form a "package" of initiatives for the future," Vladimir Gusakov stressed. He noted that, first of all, a deep understanding of the essence of the "strategic project" is necessary. Such a project should meet a number of principles and criteria: from compliance with national security requirements to ensuring economic efficiency, competitiveness of the Belarusian economy, and the growth of the welfare of the people. "A strategic project should have a special status. This is due to its introduction to the highest level of decision-making. So, there should be few such projects. Really big, image-building projects. Although the initiative should not be limited, which implies the coming Year of Quality. The main thing is that a strategic project should create a foundation for the future, be implemented in the foreseeable future and be resourcefully provided (personnel, material and technical base, intellectual property objects – patents and know-how, finance, etc.)," Vladimir Gusakov stressed.

At the meeting of the Council, it was noted that today it is important to work out an algorithm for selecting projects, both on the proposals of relevant government agencies and on the basis of initiatives from below. Letters have already been sent requesting possible project proposals to senior officials, heads of public administration bodies, regional executive committees, Minsk City Executive Committee and other decision makers (the total number of addresses is more than 60).

The Council on Strategic Projects has been established under the President of the Republic of Belarus. The corresponding decree No. 357 was signed by the Head of State on November 20. The National Academy of Sciences of Belarus is responsible for ensuring the activities of the Council. The Council was headed by Vladimir Gusakov. The main tasks of the Council are the coordination of work on the search and selection of promising strategic projects, as well as their support; analysis of their relevance, political and economic expediency, competitiveness; development of proposals for improving activities for their implementation.