Moscow: President Vladimir Putin on Friday sacked the chief of Russia's forestry agency, who came under severe criticism for failures to check wildfires in the country which left 50 people dead and left hundreds of thousands of hectares of land ablaze. Federal Forestry Agency (Rosleskhoz) chief Alexei Savinov, who came under scathing criticism due to wildfires will be replaced by his deputy Viktor Maslyakov as the new boss of the agency, which by Putin's decision has been transferred from the Agriculture Ministry to direct control of the PMO, government press service said.
Former Rosleskhoz chief was criticised by Putin for failing to properly utilise huge allocations for forest conservation.
Putin also on Friday ordered the government to subsidise interest rates on loans to farmers who are struggling to cope with the summer's drought.
A heat wave unprecedented in 130 years of record-keeping has triggered thousands of wildfires in Russia. More than 50 people have been killed and more than 2,000 homes have been destroyed.
The government will allocate 2.6 billion roubles (USD 85 million) for the program this year and a further 7.9 billion roubles (USD 258 million) in 2011, he was quoted as saying by RIA Novosti.
First Deputy Prime Minister Viktor Zubkov said additional measures to support the stricken farmers are being considered. The government will start selling the grain from the intervention fund when the need arises, he said.
Russia has a long history of using the intervention fund, which has an estimated 10 million tons of grain, as a safety net at times of droughts.
A quarter of this year's harvest has been destroyed by one of the worst droughts in the country's history, forcing the government to ban grain exports until the end of the year and reducing grain forecasts to as low as 60 million tons - 38 per cent less than last year.
However, Agriculture Minister Elena Skrynnik ruled out import of food grain.