Belarus has adopted and is implementing the State Complex Programme of development of regions, small and medium-size settlements for 2007 – 2010. This programme envisages all aspects of development of 138 settlements with overall number of population under 50 thousand people. Almost one fourth of the urban population of the country lives in these settlements.

Different towns, similar problems

Some small towns have so-called town enterprises that provide a significant number of population with jobs and invest resources into infrastructure development (for instance, a large cement-slate factory in Kastukovichi; a joint Belarusian-Austrian enterprise, glassmaking factory in Yalizava). Some small towns are lucky as they host large-scale national celebrations, for instance “Dazhinki” or Celebrations of Belarusian Literature. In those cases sufficient funds are allocated from the Republican budget for development of the infrastructure and social sector. Therefore roads are being repaired, territories are being organized, buildings are being repaired and new social and cultural establishments are being set up in those towns.

The State Complex Programme has identified 346 ‘problematic’ enterprises and organizations in small towns of Belarus that receive special tax benefits in order to attract investment resources, i.e. they are liable for 50% of the taxation rate for profits and do not have to pay a number of other taxes. However regardless of all those benefits small towns still face issues such as insufficient level of economic and social infrastructure development, bankruptcy and closure of businesses as well as complicated demographic situation, deficit of working places, low level of technical equipping.

Mstislav: the past and present

A town Mstislave in Mogilev Oblast is a good example of those issues. This is a small Belarusian town with overall population 11.7 people. It has the following industrial enterprises: butter and cheese making factory, bread factory, fodder plant, linen factory and horse factory No 120. There are 259 individual entrepreneurs and 19 unitary enterprises registered in the town. The planned investment projects include: modernization of the bread factory production; technical re-equipment of a joint-stock enterprise “Mstislav butter and cheese making factory”; reconstruction of a joint-stock company “MstislavLinen”, modernization of the production of “Mstislav Koopzagotprom”. Unemployment is one of the most serious problems in Mstislav. Many of the local inhabitants are forced to travel to the near-by Russia in order to make money.

Mstislavl is an old town. It was founded in 1135 according to the records in historical documents. It was the second important town in the Smolensk state. It was a homeland of a famous first printer Piotr Mstislavets who founded a book printing facility together with Ivan Fedorov back in XVI century in Moscow State and later on, from 1569 lived and worked in Vilnia and published many useful and beautiful books, including “Chasounik”, “Evangelic” and “Pslam”.

Therefore a decision to develop tourist infrastructure in this town was made. It is envisaged that Mstislav will become a significant tourist centre of the Southern part of the country that would reflect the influence of the Russian and Orthodox culture on Belarus. However the state is not rushing. In the mean time some enthusiastic people came up with concrete actions.

The civil society showed initiative...

Last year a group of activists from cultural organizations of Belarus initiated a Mstislav Festival of Medieval Culture to be held in the town. Mstislav Cathedral supported the idea as well as the regional executive committee. They worked hard on preparations for the event. The First “Mstislav Fest” took place on 17-19 August 2007. The programme included a knights tournament, master-classes on medieval dancing, sale-exhibition, a fire show, an Irish party, a staged siege of the castle, performance by music bands “Dzambibum”, “Kelikh Kola”, as well as excursions round the town and sight-seeing of Union and Carmelian cathedrals and Pustyn Monastery. The Festival turned out to be extremely successful.

...and didn’t find common understanding with the authorities

Representatives of Fara Cathedral in particular a priest Karal Tametski were not allowed to take part in the organization of the second Festival of the Medieval Culture. The last year initiators refused to take part in the preparation of the second Festival. Their arguments were that the local authorities were eager to turn the Festival into a formal town event.

One of the initiators of the organization of the First Festival, Julia Galinouskaya, said that they submitted the concept document, a programme and a minimal budget of the Festival to the local ideological department of the Mstislav regional executive committee. “They have rejected everything we have proposed. To my proposal to the local authorities to express what they would like to see in reality there was no feedback. We would like to see a lively celebration, a festival that would bring together entire city, however it seems that that is not the kind of celebration the authorities wanted. From our conversations it became obvious that they would like to see a formal celebration. They incorporated the knights’ festival in to the local tourism development programme. In reality they were not interested in a lively Festival at all”, said Ms. Galinouskaya.

Officially the authorities said that the budget of the Festival was too much for its scale, added Julia Galinouskaya. Ms. Galinouskaya dismissed these arguments, saying that the budget was drafted using the minimal expenses for travel, meals and lodging of the Fest participants.

“From my perspective the main reason for rejecting our idea was that we tried to engage the society in the process, so that the civil society could play the major role with regard to the organization of the festival, which is known to be not acceptable for the region’s administration. Obviously, this year’s Festival did not turn out to be at the same scale as the last year one. We as the initiators and the organizers of the First Festival, said that we had nothing to do with the organizational modalities of this year’s festival and therefore we could not guarantee neither its quality nor its level”, said Ms. Galinouskaya.

Therefore the Mstislav Fest of 2008 was organized de facto only by the town’s authorities. The major event there was a knight’s tournament with participation of over 10 clubs and over 200 people. This year’s Fest turned out rather modest compared with the last year one.

However whether the Mstislav Fest will become a traditional event and whether there is going to be the third celebration … there is still a question mark in this regard.

Ludmila Korsak