Mr Putin emphasised the special significance of Siberian Federal University as one of the country's education centres being built under the national programme on education, and stressed that such institutions of higher learning must become an incubator for training ethnic people with a higher education.

Yevgeny Vaganov, University rector, member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, and doctor of biology, updated Mr Putin as to the status of construction. The meeting emphasised the financing of the construction from the federal budget and from territorial building programmes.

Mr Putin inspected some lecture halls, had a brief conversation with third-year students in the architectural department, during a structural mechanics class, and inspected the construction of a dormitory.