RN-Vankor, a subsidiary of Rosneft Oil Company, was the general partner of the main holiday of the indigenous minorities of the North — Reindeer Herder’s Day.

Supporting the indigenous minorities of the North to preserve their national culture, traditional way of life and improve their living conditions is one of the key areas of Rosneft’s activities in its operating regions.

The holiday was traditionally held in the village of Sovetskaya Rechka in the Turukhansk district of Krasnoyarsk Territory, which is located near the Vankor cluster. The most spectacular part of the festivities was the reindeer sledding race. The winners in the men’s and women’s races were awarded gifts, new Buran snowmobiles, vital in Polar conditions, from the oil workers. The inhabitants of Sovetskaya Rechka also competed in national wrestling, jumping over a sledge and throwing a mauta to a choir (a harness is thrown over a long pole used to chase reindeer). The women presented national fish and reindeer meat dishes in the Best Tundra Mistress competition, as well as ethnic arts and crafts, the traditions of which have been handed down from generation to generation for hundreds of years. A photo exhibition on key episodes in the development of the Vankor cluster fields aroused great interest among the festival’s guests.

Sovetskaya Rechka is now the only village in the Turukhansk district where the indigenous peoples of the North continue to breed reindeer. There are 110 indigenous people living here. Among them‑ are the Evenki, the Nenets, and the smallest of the nations: the Kets, now numbering about a thousand worldwide, and the Selkups, numbering just over four thousand. They are all bearers of an ancient culture, archaic traditions and a unique language, which RN-Vankor’s oil workers protect as part of their social policy.

Preservation of the traditional way of life of the indigenous population living in the areas of Rosneft’s operating activities is an important focus of a large-scale charity programme implemented in the Turukhan District and Taimyrsky Dolgano-Nenetsky Municipal District of Krasnoyarsk Territory, and in the Krasnoselkup, Tazovsky and Purovsky Districts of the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District. Oil workers develop the infrastructure of northern villages, build housing for local residents, help reindeer herder families, improve the material and technical base of educational institutions, social and medical facilities in the areas of ancestral residence of indigenous minorities.

Rosneft
Information Division
April 18, 2022

Keywords: Social News 2022