MOSCOW — Russia's financial market should become a key instrument for the implementation of investment programs, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Zhukov has declared at the opening of a session of the government's council for competitiveness and entrepreneurship, devoted to the strategy of Russia's financial market development. Zhukov noted that it was primarily a matter of "the implementation of investment programs in the corporate sector and the creation of conditions for the efficient investment of individual savings and money from the compulsory (pension) savings system in the economy." The Deputy Prime Minister emphasized that at present, the corresponding mechanisms were not quite efficient. He remarked that this question was discussed at a Cabinet meeting in the autumn of 2004, and the federal service for financial markets had been assigned to work out a strategy for financial markets' development in connection with this. Zhukov pointed out that the government had already discussed this issue during the discussions relating to the development of the banking sector, real estate loans and the investment of pension savings. "It is obvious that an integral approach to the development of financial markets should be developed to achieve the goals of the country's social and economic development," the Deputy Prime Minister concluded.