Severnaya Neft is hammering out an agreement with the Orel regional administration to build a refinery that would have a capacity of 2 million to 3 million tons of oil a year. This would be the first refinery to be built in the country since the fall of the Soviet Union. The problems faced by small oil producers are numerous. Imported equipment is prohibitively expensive. Domestically produced machines and monitors are unreliable.
Roads are costly and difficult to build, and most sink into the swamp in a matter of months.
The list of challenges seems endless, but Iskov remains optimistic. The oil industry is riding a wave of prosperity. The Struggle for Media-MOST Gazprom has control of NTV, Segodnya newspaper and Itogi magazine, and many jouranlists have fled or been ousted. With many activists increasingly concerned over the plight of human rights in Putin's Russia, we take an in-depth look at the issue.