Russia’s economy is struggling at the beginning of 2016. Low oil prices and Western sanctions against Russia continue to affect the country’s economy. Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev thinks the economy is looking better than one year ago. But he told a conference this week that Russia must prepare for the worst-case scenario. In such a case, conditions would worsen, not improve. Medvedev spoke in Moscow at the yearly Gaidar Forum on economics. He noted that 2015 was probably the most difficult year for Russia economically in the past 10 years. The level of economic activity shrank 3.8 percent last year. Two main reasons for this were the sharp drop in the price of oil and Western economic sanctions. Oil is Russia’s main export. Its price has dropped about 70 percent to $30 a barrel over the past 12 months. Western countries placed sanctions on Russia because of its 2014 takeover of Crimea.
