Around five years ago I was interviewing one of the leaders of a business delegation from Russia at a Las Vegas industrial tradeshow. I asked him whether any American businesspeople with Russian roots stopped by the booths of the Russian companies attending the fair and inquired about the opportunities for doing business. The head of the delegation told me, though of course not for the record, that there is an unspoken directive from the Ministry not to work with immigrants. The line of argument went something like this: these people cannot be trusted; they will cause all kinds of problems, and it’s better to work with “true” Americans anyway. In all honesty, I was simply shocked by what I heard.

From the time of that conversation, Russia’s policy towards its “compatriots” – people of Russian origin living abroad – has changed dramatically. Russia recognized that it has a very large diaspora in various countries around the world, and that it would be beneficial to work with those people. The actual numbers are very high indeed. There are at least 30 million Russian people living in other countries, a figure constituting a fifth of the population of Russia itself. It would be rather unwise, to say the least, simply to forget about these individuals, who consider Russia their motherland and for whom the Russian language is the native tongue. All the more so because during the last Russian presidential elections polling places for Russian people were open in 72 countries.

The government of Moscow headed by Mayor Yuriy Luzhkov was one of the frontrunners in beginning to collaborate closely with Russian people residing in other countries. The Russian capital established an organization called the Moscow House of the Compatriot that now works with the entire Russian diaspora. In 2003, an International Council of Russian Compatriots was created with a membership base of more than 700 organizations from 62 countries of the world.

The Russian federal government, too, implements programs for creating a firm bond between the mother-country and the Russian citizens abroad. The Governmental Commission for the Affairs of Compatriots Residing Abroad, chaired by the Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov, is working very actively. Budgetary outlays for establishing closer collaboration with the Russian communities around the world in the areas of culture and education increase on annual basis. In 2007, the Russian President took the initiative of creating the Russian World foundation, an entity dedicated to preserving and spreading the Russian language and culture in communities across the planet.

The government of Moscow has recently approved its third all-inclusive program for working with the Russian compatriots from 2009 to 2011. What is also interesting to note is that Moscow has started business cooperation with the Russian people residing in different countries of the world. A network of Russian travel companies under the name of RusTour is presently being created to unite all owners of travel agencies. Moscow promises assistance in getting discounts on airline tickets, hotels, and tours inside Russia. Another project involves the creation of Russian book & souvenirs stores.