Yury Trutnev (Þðèé Ïåòðîâè÷ Òðóòíåâ) was born on March 1, 1956, in Perm into a family of oil industry workers.

Education: Mine engineering, Perm Polytechnic Institute, 1978.

1978: Engineer, junior researcher at the Perm Scientific Research Institute of Petroleum Industry

1981-1986: Instructor in the Perm municipal Komsomol committee

1986-1988: Worked on the sports committee of the Perm regional executive committee

1988: Founded Kontakt, a sporting goods company

1990: Founded Eks Limited, which imported and sold foodstuffs. He became president of Eks International in 1996.

1994: Appointed deputy of the Perm municipal legislature, where he headed the committee on economic policy and taxation.

December 1996: Elected mayor of Perm

2000: Elected governor of the Perm region, replacing Gennady Igumnov

March 2004: Appointed natural resources minister by presidential decree

From the beginning, he opposed reviving output sharing agreements with Western oil majors (story). In early 2005, he announced that Russia would not allow foreign companies to bid for some of the nations largest reserves deposits (story 1, 2).

In 2006, he vowed tighter limits on foreign investment in the energy sector (story) and threatened to revoke licenses granted to energy majors BP and Shell (story 1, 2). In December, Shell and its Japanese partners agreed to sell a controlling stake in Sakhalin-2 to Gazprom for $7.45 billion (story).

May 2008: Appointed natural resources and environment minister by presidential decree. Highlights of his tenure include a ban on killing of seal pups (story) and a newfound emphasis on easing foreign investors’ access to Russian resources after years of crackdowns (story).

Trutnev is married and has five children. He is a karate expert.

According to his earnings statement, Trutnev earned 369.94 million rubles ($11 million) in 2008, more than any other member of the government that year (story).