Russia modifies World Cup contracts to cut imports

The Russian government hopes to save some money by cutting expensive imports from its World Cup construction plans.

Despite rallying in recent months, the ruble has lost about a third of its value against the dollar since the start of last year, making imported materials for stadiums significantly more expensive than planned.

The government responded Monday by issuing an order to modify the state procurement contracts for five new stadiums.

The changes foresee imported materials replaced by Russian-made equivalents where possible and a "simplification" of the stadium designs, especially the roofing.

The contracts concerned are worth more than 10 billion rubles ($190 million) out of a total budget of 637.6 billion rubles ($12.1 billion) for the 2018 World Cup.