The Russian Black Sea resort city of Sochi tops the list of Russia’s 30 best cities for doing business, according to a Forbes survey published on Wednesday.
The Forbes rating, published for the fourth time, is based on several indicators including human and financial resources, infrastructure, administrative barriers, taxes and size of population .
Sochi has the least administrative pressure, tax officials tolerant to local business and affordable finance, Forbes said.
Ufa, the capital of the Republic of Bashkortostan in the southern Urals, and the Urals city of Chelyabinsk came second and third in terms of doing business in Russia, trailing slightly behind Sochi.
Russia’s largest cities of Moscow and St. Petersburg were included in the rating for the first time this year but were rated near the bottom of the list, placed 27th and 29th.
In 2010, when the previous rating was compiled, the first top three cities were Krasnodar in south Russia, Khabarovsk in the Russian Far East and Yekaterinburg in the Urals.
The top ten cities for doing business in Russia in 2012 also include Tyumen, Nizhny Novgorod, Makhachkala, Kazan, Ulan-Ude and Krasnodar while Rostov-on-Don is at the very bottom of the list.
