Development of Local Communities

We cooperate on a regional basis in programmes relating to employment and career guidance, youth policy, sport, health service, support of social infrastructure facilities and assistance to vulnerable segments of the population. Usually we do this through agreements with regional authorities, cooperating with them to ensure a stable economy and society in regions where we operate.

For example, we opened a Civic Service Centre in cooperation with the regional government and city administration in Cherepovets, Vologda Region, in February 2009.

During 2009, we were deeply involved in employment programmes at regional and city level. Vocational rehabilitation programmes covered 1,299 employees at the Cherepovets Steel Mill. They involved retraining workers, working on their versatility and upgrading their skills. These employees were paid average wages and salaries in compliance with the collective bargaining agreement, and have all found employment. We signed 593 people up for civic service, about 2,000 people for temporary work, and 171 people for internship.

Our business unit, Vorkutaugol, in the Severstal Resources division, provided employment for 260 people, and about 60 people took advanced retraining courses in the division’s training centre. At the Olcon, 15 people found employment with other business units in the Murmansk region, and 8 were transferred to the Kola Mining and Metallurgical Company. Redundant employees of OAO Karelsky Okatysh (Karelian Pellet) were offered additional retraining to find needed jobs.

The non-profit partnership, Urban Development Agency, set up jointly with the Mayor’s Office in 1999 to encourage small and mediumsized businesses, continued its work. The results of the its activities in 2009 included 661 new business units, 3,200 new jobs, 1,429 individual entrepreneurs, plus a total of 1,170 start-up entrepreneurs were trained and 536 business promotion events held.

July 2009 saw the launch of a joint project dubbed Cherepovets Foresight up to 2020, run by the Cherepovets municipal administration and Severstal The project is scheduled for completion in 2020. It targets promising niches in the development of the city’s economy, which will ensure a more balanced budget, and employment that takes into account industry’s cyclic pattern and long-term trends, as well as federal (regional) policy and available resources, and so helps formulate the necessary steps to be taken.

Last year our business units directed considerable efforts toward developing sports and holding cultural events in regions where we operates.

Karelsky Okatysh (Karelian Pellet) annually finances the upkeep of the Cultural and Sport Centre, Friendship, with more than 90,000 people attending various events in 2009, and a total of 56 sports events with over 4,000 participants were held there. One of the highlights was the 21st International Festival of Chamber Art.

Last year Vorkutaugol conducted a programme of social partnership with the city. The Company backed the 11th Spartakiada (sport games) of Northern Nations, and also continued to fund the sports complex, Olimp, and the miners’ Palace of Culture, two principal social facilities in the city. The Company earmarks $1.3 million for these facilities.

In 2009, Lucchini financially supported the young team Piombino Football club.

Charity work performed by Severstal North America primarily involves cooperation with local communities and municipal organisations. They support the non-profit organisation, Junior Auxiliary, which helps needy school-age children, and allocated funds to the charity, United Way. They also backed the Michigan Economic Development Foundation, a non-profit organisation for the development of small businesses.

2009 became the start year for three projects that won our grant competition Museums of the Russian North. We organised a total grant fund of $280,000, with the help of the Russian branch of UK charity CAF Russia. Six projects from Russia’s North West, a strategic region where most of our Russian business units are located, won the contest.

As for support of historical and cultural heritage, we continue to cooperate with the Russian Museum, the Tretyakov Gallery and the Bolshoi Theatre. Among joint projects with the Russian Museum is major exhibition project, American Artists from the Russian Empire, which was introduced in Moscow and St. Petersburg, as well as the exhibition styled Diaghilev – The Beginning. Other projects undertaken in cooperation with the Tretyakov Gallery are Natalia Goncharova in Germany and Russian Artists-Travellers in Moscow. A premier of ballet Esmeralda was held in the Bolshoi Theatre with our support, and Riga saw a theatrical festival named the Gold Mask in Latvia.

In 2009, we continued to implement our programme, Road to Home, for comprehensive prevention of child neglect and social orphanhood in Cherepovets. Launched as a joint project with municipal authorities, and social and psychological experts from a non-profit organization in Cherepovets, the programme proved to be efficient. It was awarded the status of a regional programme of the Vologda Region in June 2009. Competing for the best regional programme, Road to Home was awarded a grant from the Russian Children In Need Fund. The amount allocated to dealing with families in crisis to prevent child neglect and social orphanhood in the Vologda Region, therefore, comes today from three sources, namely: the regional budget, Severstal’s own money and the Children Support Fund’s.