Russia has selected South Africa as one of the few countries where it will deploy its “digital attachés”.
The US has a similar initiative, called the Digital Attaché Programme, with a mission to help promote and defend US digital commercial interests.
The Digital Attaché Programme began in March 2016 in the US and initially started out as a six-month pilot project that concluded in September 2016.
In December 2017, the US expanded the programme into six new markets – South Korea, Indonesia, Mexico, South Africa, Germany and France.
This week, the ministry of finance in Russia announced that as part of the implementation of the second package of measures to support the IT industry in Russia, a service of “digital attachés” will be created.
In 2022, they will start working in 16 countries around the world, says the ministry.
Among the first countries considered are South Africa, Brazil, Vietnam, Germany, Egypt, India, Iran, Kazakhstan, Cuba, Malaysia, UAE, Singapore, Thailand, Turkey and South Korea.
“The measures for the formation of the institute of ‘digital attachés’ are provided for by the second package of measures to support the IT industry, approved by the chairman of the government of the Russian Federation Mikhail Mishustin,” says Dmitry Chernyshenko, deputy prime minister of the government of the Russian Federation.
“The selected candidates will conduct comprehensive work on the promotion of domestic software products abroad, and provide consulting, information and analytical, legal and organisational support to Russian IT companies in the countries of presence.
“Their main task is to develop the export of Russian digital solutions. It is planned that in 2022 ‘digital attachés’ will start working in 16 countries: Brazil, Vietnam, Malaysia and others. In the future, the geography of their presence will expand – by 2024 to 28 countries of presence,” notes Mishustin.
The Russian ministry of finance will be responsible for the selection of specialists in the service.
The ministry has already announced a competition for positions in trade missions of the Russian Federation abroad.
“The initiative to create a ‘digital attaché’ service was proposed by representatives of the IT industry as part of the preparation of the second package of support measures,” says Maxim Parshin, deputy head of the ministry of finance of Russia.
“Digital attachés should be well-versed in Russian and foreign software products and at the same time understand the competitive advantages of domestic solutions. Knowledge of Russian and international legislation in the field of trade is important. And, of course, the basic requirements for candidates are higher education not lower than a specialty or a master's degree and knowledge of the language of the host country.”
Share