National Fund for the Rebirth of the Russian Country Estate

The National Fund for the Rebirth of the Russian Country Estate (shortly the NF RRCE) is the only non-governmental organization in Russia that deals professionally with the whole set of research, land ownership, and investment programs related to the rebirth of historical country estates. The `Russian Estate` Fund was created in 2000 thanks to the joint efforts and enthusiasm of a group of professionals, the Institute of Nature and Cultural Heritage named after D.S. Likhachev, Russian Assembly of Nobility, Moscow Historical Genealogy Society, and others. Currently it is one of the co-founders of its successor - the National Fund for the Rebirth of the Russian Country Estate. The main activities of the Fund include selection, examination (legal, construction, and environmental), and evaluation of country estates in Central Russia, as well as development of investment programs for their restoration and usage. There were about 70-80 thousand country estates in Russia in the 19th century. Unfortunately, that means ten times more than listed in the Russian Federation Register of monuments nowadays. Within the five years of its activity, the NF RRCE has been researching country estates in Moscow, Vladimir, Ivanovo, Kaluga, Kostroma, Lipetsk, Pskov, Ryazan, Smolensk, Tula, Tver, and Yaroslavl regions. As a result, the only Single database on historical country estates has been developing. At present time the NF RRCE possesses the full and unique information on 2000 cultural heritage entities. Each of them has been described by following specific techniques developed by the Fund. The description of the cultural monument includes all aspects of conservation, definition of ownership for each country estate and adjacent territory, as well as a comprehensive analysis of their investment potential in the context of the regional economic. Similar work is being conducted for more than 3.5 thousand estates. Legal regulation of conservation, preservation, and usage of cultural heritage objects of Russia has many problems, as old laws are still current, slow formation of a new ones came to a critical situation in the heritage sphere. Non-ability of the old system to involve monuments into valuable cultural and economic circulation, a set of contradictions between different legislative bodies came to enormous losses of monuments. In this connection, the NF RRCE promotes the development of the due legal base being the working group member of the State Policy Experts Board which established by the Russian Federation Ministry of Culture and Mass Communications (the Chairman of the Experts Board is Minister A.S. Sokolov). The NF RRCE works on selection, examination, and evaluation of country estates, as well as preparing offers for interested investors in close collaboration with: - federal, regional, and local Administrations; - Committees on Culture of regional Administrations; - State Property Committees; - State Centers for registration, use, and restoration of the historical and cultural monuments. Among the NF RRCE's partners are famous museums, archives, libraries, scientific and cultural NGOs, enterprises, finance and trade companies. Rebirth of Russian country estates is important for economic development of the regions of the Central Russia. Russian estates are located in rural areas that recently has experienced degradation of social and economic structures and institutions, loss of local cultural values and ethics. It has been demonstrated by the positive, though not numerous, examples, that the reborn country estates facilitate a creation of new jobs, increase welfare, and serve to overcome the social and economic gap between city and village.