Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said Russia will spend 1.5 trillion roubles ($53.30 billion) to boost the country's birth rate by between 25 and 30 per cent by 2015 to offset the country's declining population.
"According to preliminary calculations, between 2011 and 2015 some 1.5 trillion roubles will be invested in demography projects," he told the country's parliament today in an annual report.
"First, we expect the average life expectancy to reach 71 years. Second, we expect to increase the birth rate by 25 to 30 percent in comparison to the 2006 birth rate," he said.
He said Russia was emerging powerfully from the global financial crisis but must reduce its reliance on energy and raw materials to see off external threats to its economy.
He did not say whether he and President Dmitry Medvedev had agreed which of them would run in next year's presidential election but underlined his own credentials by outlining his government's economic achievements.
He told the State Duma lower house in his more than two-hour annual report that inflation would not exceed 6.5 to 7.5 per cent in 2011 and that gross domestic product grew by 4.4 per cent in the first quarter of the year.
But he said Russia also faced unspecified external threats to its $1.5 trillion economy and the country of 143 million people could not afford to sit back after overcoming the worst of the financial crisis.
"Based on GDP, Russia should enter the ranks of the five leading countries (by 2020)," he told deputies, adding that GDP per capita should reach $35,000 by then.
"The current beneficial environment in the raw materials and hydrocarbons (markets) should not make us relax. The oil boom we are witnessing only underlines the need to move quickly to a new model of economic development."
He said he had no plans to crack down on the Internet ahead of 2012 elections, seeking to play down concerns over recent hacker attacks on a blogging website.
"My personal opinion is that I don't think it is possible to limit anything," he said, answering a question from a lawmaker after the address.
Attacks on Russia's most popular blogging site and a security service warning to Gmail and Skype have renewed fears that authorities want to control Internet usage ahead of 2012 polls.
Social networking websites like Facebook played a crucial role in demonstrations and uprisings that rocked the Arab world this year, prompting some governments to shut down internet access.
Mr Putin said security services were concerned that the Internet could be used against the interests of the country, but added that "it is their concern".
"We don't plan on slapping down anything," he said, making a play on words that referred to the Cheka, a KGB predecessor agency that notoriously cracked down on dissent in the early days of the Soviet Union.
In a country where much media is state-run, the Internet is one of the last bastions of free speech.
Russian bloggers freely criticise authorities, often scathingly, question high-level corruption and swap information.
Security analysts say this month's cyber attacks on blogging service Live Journal could be a trial run for closing down more websites in the event of unrest.