Examining russian regions from an import substitution perspective

Abstract

The paper is devoted to an empirical analysis of Russian foreign trade taking into account its sectoral and regional characteristics. A typology of Russian regions based on import activity is carried out; and main types are analyzed from an import-substituting perspective, which is one of the urgent questions of the modern Russian economy. The authors' method of region typology is based on a combination of integrated assessments of homogeneity/heterogeneity of regional import structure by seven commodity groupings used in Russian state statistics; and the graphical visualization of their results are presented in the paper. In the process of investigating sectoral structure of the regions' imports, we managed to identify six types of subjects of the Russian Federation. The most representative group includes regions with predominant expenditures on imports of machine-building products (70 percent subjects of the Russian Federation). This group of regions and the machine-building sector of the national economy were the basis for recommendations on the development of international cooperation and import substitution. Some conclusions on spatial concentration of import activity and some recommendations on import substitution are presented in the final section of the paper.