The privatization program of the City of St. Petersburg

When the mayor of St. Petersburg asked the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) for advice on how to privatize the approximately 15,000 enterprises in the city's portfolio, the EBRD decided that it would be efficient to select a number of companies for pilot transactions. To oversee privatization of the eligible assets, the city established 2 bodies in early 1992, the St. Petersburg Property Committee and the St. Petersburg Property Fund. The EBRD developed a set of criteria for selecting the companies that would be good examples for future privatizations. The 3 pilot companies selected were a toiletries producer, a sweets producer, and a major retail chain. For the toiletries and sweets companies, the EBRD recommended that a foreign investor be sought. For the department store, the recommended strategy was to attract a foreign investor to assist in refurbishing the stores, and to offer shares in the company to domestic retail and institutional investors.