5 Kopecks

Arktikugol — the Soviet state trust that operated coal mines on the Svalbard archipelago — issued its own scrip currency for use at Barentsburg and Pyramiden, the two Soviet settlements on Norwegian-administered territory. Because Norwegian law governed the islands under the 1920 Spitsbergen Treaty, ordinary Soviet rubles had no legal basis for circulation there, and importing hard currency was politically inconvenient. Scrip was the functional solution.

The 1979 series replaced earlier issues as the mining population stabilized. Denominations circulated in the settlement stores and canteens, redeemable only within the Arktikugol system — worthless the moment a worker stepped onto the mainland ferry.