So that all the guys: children’s camps got a chance for state support

Activities for the organization of children’s recreation and health improvement of children received their own OKVED-85.41.91. The innovation comes into force on March 1, 2021. According to experts, this gives hope that the government will nevertheless create an effective mechanism to support the industry. Meanwhile, one should not count on the immediate improvement of the segment of children’s recreation. Izvestia understood the situation.

The circle of separation

In 2020, due to the pandemic, only 20.5% of the available children’s holiday camps were used, accepting 891.5 thousand children. This is six times less than in 2019. Such statistics were voiced at the beginning of the year by Anna Kuznetsova, ombudsman for the rights of the child in Russia.

The pandemic has dealt a heavy blow to the children’s recreation industry. For example, according to the Ministry of Tourism of the Krasnodar Territory, the damage to children’s camps in the Kuban amounted to almost 3 billion rubles. “I know debtors for both 8 million (refund for vouchers) and 15-20 million (investments in renovations plus refunds for vouchers). There are people who took out a 50 million loan for the construction of a new building, the financial model was considered to be in active sales all year round, with an average annual load of 60–70%. The work was opened only in mid-July, and then with a load of 50% and additional costs for personnel, chemistry, and so on. The restrictions on loading the tap changer were extended until the end of 2021. Accordingly, the financial model breaks down and the owner is forced to either go bankrupt or sell off other assets, ”said a market expert, who asked to remain anonymous.

According to the Children’s Ombudsman, in 2020, about 350 (only 1/4 of them) recreation organizations for children were able to take advantage of the state support provided for the coronavirus pandemic. Recall that in total in Russia, according to data for 2019, there were about 2,300 suburban stationary camps, of which about 700 were private. About 1000 camps were tent camps, but they were completely banned.

For the most part, the organization of children’s recreation could not take advantage of the support measures in 2020, because there was no separate OKVED code under which children’s camps could operate. “Previously, it was possible to become a children’s camp in several groups – from temporary residence facilities to additional education. Hence the collapse with the help of a unified approach to obtaining OKVED at children’s centers for a long time, “- recalled the head of the Krasnodar tour operator” NiKa-M “Dmitry Sarzhanov.

Yes, the camps at one time already had the OKVED code 55.23.1 “Activity of children’s camps during the holidays.” But on January 1, 2017, it expired. After that, the camp owners registered their economic activities under different codes, more often OKVED 55.20 “Activities for providing places for short-term accommodation” or used other codes of the hotel or educational sections of the classifier, and said. about. Director of the FSBEI DO “Federal Center for Children and Youth Tourism and Local History” Leonid Protsenko.

Thus, the children’s camp was not defined as a separate subject of economic activity, which clearly did not meet the objectives of developing this segment of the economy and, accordingly, improving the quality of the provision of recreation and health services, explained Protsenko.

“Children’s recreation suffered a lot last year. Initially, this line of business is not highly profitable, but requires maximum responsibility and tension. Over the past year, a large number of players in the children’s recreation market simply could not open up, someone repurposed in order to survive. We managed to open up and work, thanks to a three-year contract under the state contract “Children of Kuban”, ”noted Valery Dimoev, General Director of DSOK“ Zhemchuzhina ”(city of Anapa).

Hope for salvation

In April 2020, a working group of the State Duma sent requests to relevant ministries with a request to enter a separate code for children’s rest and recreation in the All-Russian classifier of products by type of economic activity and the All-Russian classifier of types of economic activity. The initiative to allocate a separate code for children’s camps was supported by Rosturizm, the Ministry of Education, the expert community. And, finally, the Ministry of Industry and Trade of the Russian Federation has allocated a separate OKVED.

Activities for the organization of children’s recreation and health improvement received their own OKVED-85.41.91, which belongs to the general class “Education”. The changes will take effect from March 1, 2021.

This news was received positively by the business community. Olga Sanaeva, Vice-President of the Russian Union of Travel Industry, believes that our own OKVED will allow receiving subsidies and other support measures, assistance from the state will become more targeted. In 2020, it was strictly tied to the OKVED, and the OKVEDs, which included children’s camps, for the most part were not eligible for subsidies.

“Due to restrictions on children’s recreation and almost complete lack of support, the segment of children’s recreation has suffered colossal losses. It was a disaster last summer, and the prospects for this one are dim. Of course, this sector, as one of the most severely affected, needs help. This segment will face a long recovery. AND here we are talking not only about the owners of children’s camps, but also about tour operators specializing in children’s recreation. We will strive to ensure that they also receive state support“, – says Sanaeva.

Valery Dolgikh, director of the New Generation camp (Perm Territory), a member of the council of the international community of camps, called the new OKVED a good, but somewhat belated measure. Indeed, due to the lack of its own OKVED, most of the children’s recreation organizations could not receive state support in 2020. “Again, it will probably be possible to take advantage of retroactive support measures, as well as count on state aid in 2021. But, perhaps, the most important value of returning an independent OKVED is the ability to create your own profile law. There is also such a moment: the new OKVED is in the group of educational services, and I do not want to fall under education in full. But so far there is no talk of this, ”said Dolgikh.

Valery Dimoev has a positive attitude. He says that separation into an independent OKVED implies targeted support from the state for the sphere, purposefully for the needs of the industry. It is very difficult to compete without annual improvement of infrastructure, which requires serious investments. Leonid Protsenko also highly appreciated the innovation, noting at the same time that this is a measure that allows the regions to concretize measures to support the recreation and health of children.

The expert recalled that the speech on the restoration of OKVED was conducted for a very long time at various sites, including within the framework of the work of groups of the Ministry of Education of Russia, ONF, ASI, the Public Chamber, and the situation of the pandemic in 2020 showed the highest degree of necessity to separate the sphere of recreation and health improvement of children into a separate branch group. Since there was no separate OKVED code, there was no reason to receive assistance from the state in 2020, which was strictly tied to OKVED and made it possible to specify the government’s actions in relation to this extremely difficult and socially oriented type of business.

“Most of the camps in terms of providing state support were attributed to the tourism industry, but the specifics of running the camp are in many respects fundamentally different from an ordinary hotel or, moreover, a tour operator. So, for example, in the requirements for an applicant for state support, the percentage of staff turnover was determined relative to permanent staff. Of course, these are impracticable criteria, since counselors are hired as seasonal workers and for the vacation period there are many times more of them than the main staff. And there are a lot of such examples.“, – believes Protsenko.

Marina Gritsun, Chairperson of the Union of Organizers of Children’s and Active Tourism (SODAT), commented on the separation of activities to organize children’s recreation and children’s health improvement into an independent OKVED:The measure is undoubtedly important, but, I must admit, we expected it much earlier. Public associations more than two years ago applied to the authorities with a request to restore an independent OKVED“.

This should have happened in March last year. Then children’s camps, as one of the most affected spheres, could receive targeted support from the state, and, perhaps, losses in this segment would not reach the current 70%, the shadow sector would not have grown so much. “Here I am also talking about those camps that conduct programs at the sites of hotels and recreation centers that accept children, without falling under such strict legislative regulation as an official children’s camp operating in the legal field,” Gritsun explained. …

Dmitry Sarzhanov shares the opinion of his colleague: “A separate OKVED will allow getting more targeted state support. Of course, this measure was at least 11 months late, because only in the Krasnodar Territory in 2020 only 35% of the number of children’s centers announced at the beginning of 2020 resumed their work as a children’s camp. But if the industry is not helped in 2021, then children’s holidays will remain a memory for many. Here it should be noted the efforts of the regional authorities to support the industry, but we cannot do without federal assistance. It is not yet clear whether it is necessary to quickly receive new codes or not – OKVED is in the group of educational services and we have moved away from the tourism industry. Group “Educational Services” implies obtaining a special license and many other responsibilities. What this can lead to according to our OKVED codes, we do not yet know, we have not seen official explanations yet, ”Sarzhanov said.

Meanwhile, Protsenko said that the very fact that the OKVED activity for organizing children’s recreation and health improvement is “educational” does not imply a mandatory license to conduct educational services. The camp, according to Protsenko, must be in the regional register, and you can enter there by submitting an adequate set of documents to the regional authorized executive body in the field of recreation and recreation of children. But if the camp wants to get a license to conduct educational activities, then the presence of an “educational” OKVED may even act as a kind of motivational condition for expanding the range of services provided during the child’s summer vacation. As for hotels that accepted children, but at the same time were not a camp in the context of 124-FZ, then, of course, there is no need to change the main OKVED code.

Into the future with hope

Experts see the prospects for the development of the children’s recreation segment as a whole not catastrophic, however, the restoration or reformatting of the industry will take a long time.

“A change in the epidemiological situation will be able to affect the current restrictions on the placement of children in camps, which will make it possible to quickly“ heal the wounds ”of 2020. Perhaps many camps will change owners. On the positive side: investors appear who are ready to work in this segment, despite its long payback period. It should be noted that the Ministry of Education of Russia, together with Rosturizm, VEB, representatives of regional authorities, are actively and comprehensively working to find effective solutions for the restoration and development of the recreation and recreation of children in Russia, ”said Leonid Protsenko.

We will remind that earlier Rosturizm proposed to include in the tourist cashback program companies involved in organizing children’s recreation and their recovery.