MOSCOW — The government met on Thursday to discuss the country’s social and economic performance in the first half of this year. The main item on the agenda was termination of the medium-term economic development program. In other words, the government has dropped plans to double the national GDP by 2010.

To achieve that goal, the economy should be growing by at least 7.2 percent annually. But a slower growth is expected this year and next. The economy ministry projected the national economy to grow by 5.8 percent next year, with oil prices averaging $40 per barrel, and inflation is expected to remain between 7 and 8.5 percent.

The costs of creating an investment fund will be included in next year’s budget. Minimum participation of private capital in state investment projects will be raised from 10 percent to between 20 and 25 percent.

Meanwhile, more than half of Russians – 53 percent – disapprove of the government’s performance, an opinion poll conducted by ROMIR Monitoring has shown. The strongest disapproval levels – 58 percent - were registered in large cities with a population of 500,000 to 1 million people.

Forty one percent approved of the Cabinet’s performance. The highest approval rating – 47 percent – was reported in cities with a population of 100,000 to 500,000. Older people were more critical of the government, the poll showed, with 55 percent of respondents over 45 years registering their dissatisfaction, and 51 percent aged between 18 and 24 approving of the government’s work.