The meeting was held in the Nedra Yamala building, which also houses the regional database of mineral resources in the Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Area. The Prime Minister and the heads of foreign companies attended a presentation of the Economic Development Guidelines of the Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Area within the Strategy 2020 concept.

Vladimir Putin's address:

Ladies and gentlemen, I am happy to welcome here both the Russian participants of the meeting and our foreign colleagues. A considerable number of foreign companies, 10 top companies, are represented here.

I can assure you that you have not made this long trip "to the end of the Earth" in vain. Many of you have been working with Russian companies in many parts of Russia successfully and for a long time. Many others are our marketing partners. Together, we have done a lot, but there is still much more we can do.

The region to which you have come, the Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Area, is the leader in the production of natural gas. It accounts for some 90% of Russia's gas production.

When we speak about large deposits, we often mention very impressive figures, like one trillion, or two trillion... We have 3-3.5 trillion cubic metres of gas in the Shtokman deposit in the Barents Sea. This is an impressive figure indeed, because it means that we can produce large amounts of gas there for 25 years.

But the region where you have come today is absolutely unique. It is a constituent region of Russia, the Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Area. The Yamal Peninsula, part of the area, has 12 trillion cubic metres of gas in prospected deposits. Experts say confidently that this figure can be easily increased to 50 trillion. In all, the Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Area has 125 trillion cubic metres of prospected gas reserves.

I would like to draw your attention to this figure, because it shows that Russia is certain to remain the absolute leader in gas production and sale for the next few decades. And, of course, we can resolve our domestic energy problems and honour all of our export commitments.

This means that we can easily - I repeat, easily - implement any infrastructure project such as Nord Stream or South Stream. Moreover, these reserves will cushion volatility on all economic markets and enhance the global energy stability. So the immediate task is to use these riches efficiently, rationally and wisely.

The fact that we have met here today, and that we invited you here, is evidence of our respect for the technology and production standards at your companies.

It is also evidence of our respect for our joint achievements of the past few years.

It is evidence of Russia's commitment to remaining an energy power with an open and liberal market economy. We invite our main partners to take part in joint projects.

We hope to find solutions, even in the most challenging projects, which will be acceptable and interesting to us and to our partners.

Let us begin our meeting today with a survey of the mineral resources of the region where we have met.

After that we will move to another room, where we will hold practical and detailed discussions of the problems facing us in this new oil and gas treasury of Russia, which we are going to open.

Thank you.