Agriculture and livestock
Agriculture encounters severe obstacles in natural conditions, especially in climatic conditions, which make it impossible on almost half of the territory. Only 13% of the surface is suitable for cultivation and of this extension 8% is made up of arable land, 6% of meadows and pastures and about 50% of forests. Moreover, these are enormous surfaces in absolute terms: cereals alone, grown beyond the limit of the taiga, cover about 40 million ha; Russia is the first world producer of barley and oats and one of the first of wheat (however insufficient for internal demand), potatoes and beets, and produces large quantities of vegetables. Mechanization, promoted for some time, is necessary both to cope with the vast extensions to cultivation, and to reduce the processing times within the restricted vegetative period, but it represents a heavy immobilization of capital, which does not yield for most of the year; if the situation was somehow sustainable for collective companies (kolkhoz) and state ( sovkhoz) of the Soviet era, it is not always the case for the new private owners (however, almost all the already collective companies have taken on the structure of cooperatives or companies, which makes it possible to better address management problems at the scale of thousands of ha available). ● Livestock farming has undergone a sharp contraction as a result of economic reforms and the impoverishment of the population; however (2006) cattle are 21.5 million, pigs 13.5 million, sheep and goats over 18; in the far north reindeer husbandry is practiced. Fishing also recorded a decline in production, due to competition from better equipped fleets, but still achieves 3.5 million tonnes of catch. ● Forests provided 190 million m 3 in 2006of timber, which feed one of the main activities of the northern and Siberian regions (Archangel, Tomsk, Bratsk) and a significant flow of exports.
Industrialization
The true industrialization of the country, beyond the extraction of minerals and the processing of food and textile products, can be traced back to the years following the establishment of the USSR and the start of the steel industry in full cycle plants (kombinat). The localization of the activities, however, remained similar to the traditional one, based on Ukrainian iron and coal from the Don basin, to which that of the Urals was added, and on Azeri oil (Baku) and the lower reaches of the Volga (the basin called ‘Second Baku’); the urgency to support an autarchic and isolated economy, committed to basic infrastructure, led to the growing exploitation of these resources and the strengthening of heavy industry in the European region, then also to the development of a mechanical industry (agricultural machinery, railway and war material), with some evolution in the metallurgy sector (aluminum), a growing use of hydroelectric energy and a slow expansion of industrialization towards the east. The Second World War this latter trend suddenly accelerated, mainly for military reasons, which was then strengthened by the 1960s, enhancing the regions straddling the Urals and the northern ones, both in the European region (Peciora carboniferous basin) and in Siberia. On the whole, however, the Siberian regions differed little from the role of producers of raw materials, while the Western ones could differentiate the range of industrial products, including those destined for final consumption.
Energy resources
The great development of the Kuzbass carboniferous basin, E of the Urals, of the Baikal region, of Iacuzia, and in general of the regions crossed by the Trans-Siberian (but also in the far north), was supported by the construction of territorial production complexes ‘, planned and equipped according to specific basic productions; of particular importance, among these complexes, is that of the ‘third Baku’ (low courses of the Irtyš and the Ob´, from Tyumen to the Arctic Ocean), one of the most productive oil fields in the world. In the early 21st century. the production of coal has greatly reduced (230 million tons in 2007), thanks to the increasing availability of oil (also extracted N of Baikal, on the island of Sahalin and in various other regions) and of natural gas (mainly coming from same areas).
● The Russia,3) and leading exporter of gas, of which it also holds by far the largest reserves. Other hydrocarbon deposits have been identified on the Arctic Sea shelf, where the reduction of the ice sheet has made both coastal navigation and mineral exploration possible. A geopolitical competition has developed on the management of hydrocarbons in which Russia is the protagonist. A good part of the regions are the theater of serious geopolitical tensions today (Caucasus, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Xinjiang) are involved in the extraction or transit of hydrocarbons and are close to the Russia; at the same time, Russian hydrocarbons are sent to foreign consumption areas by means of pipelines that most often cross foreign territories (former Soviet republics).
● Distribution required the construction of an impressive network of pipelines (almost 160,000 km of gas pipelines and 90,000 km of oil pipelines, mostly serving the Russian territory), to which new sections are constantly being added. By managing its resources, relative prices and transport infrastructures, Russia works to influence its closest competitors or customers or transit countries and to counterbalance their economic or political competition. For example., Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, and distributes it with its pipeline network, enhanced thanks to an agreement with Kazakhstan; Kazakh gas is also sold to China through a Russian pipeline. Another example is the very important function performed by the 4,500 km of the ‘Friendship’ oil pipeline and the gas pipeline that flanks it, which for decades have supplied central and western Europe through Ukraine; this is also a buyer, but with Russia has entered into a tough dispute; in 2005, however, the Blue Stream gas pipeline came into operation, which from the Novorossijsk terminal reaches Samsun, in Turkey, and from there to Western Europe, while another gas pipeline (South Stream) which, via the Black Sea, will reach Bulgaria and Western Europe; the two pipelines avoid transit through Ukrainian (and Caucasian) territory. Finally, a gas pipeline is almost completed, largely under the Baltic Sea, which, avoiding territories of other states, reaches Germany ; the construction of a new oil terminal in Primorsk on the Baltic has also made the Latvian port of Ventspils useless. Other pipelines involve the northern ports, from where the hydrocarbons are loaded, or the Novorossijsk terminal on the Black Sea, or the ports of the Russian Far East.
● The energy picture is completed by hydroelectric production, which accounts for 20% of the electricity produced (almost as much is of thermonuclear origin), early developed thanks to the favorable conditions of the river system. The association of iron and coal deposits (Southern Urals, Kuzbass, Baikal region) is also favorable; despite the posting of Ukraine, iron production (110 million tonnes) remains very high.
● For other mineral resources, Russia is among the leading world producers of gold, diamonds, platinum, uranium, copper, nickel, tin, molybdenum, sulfur, natural phosphates;
Types of industry
The localization of the industry, favoring places close to raw materials and product markets, has clearly favored the European Union. In St. Petersburg the mechanical and precision, chemical, pharmaceutical and food industries prevail. The very large industrial region of Moscow has the greatest variety of production, also including consumer goods industries, which find the largest market in the region, and technologically advanced (electronics, optics, aeronautics). In the Donbass and in the middle Volga mechanical industries developed. The production of motor vehicles, at first only of lorries, then also of motor vehicles (starting with the construction of a Fiat plant in Togliatti), which increased to 25 million cars in circulation in 2005, is distributed in various cities of the European region. More oriented to the primary processing of minerals and to basic chemistry or metallurgy are the areas of the Urals, and especially those of Siberia, in the Kuzbass and in the region to the West of Baikal. In the Russian Far East, Komsomol´sk (steel, petrochemical, mechanical, food and wood) and Vladivostok (shipyards, canning industry) are the main industrial centers.
Communications and Commerce
The road (over 700,000 km, plus 30,000 km of motorways) and rail (92,000 km) communications network is well developed in the European sector and in the southern belt of Siberia, where the Trans-Siberian (9434 km double track since 1936, electrified) is the bearing axis. In the whole subarctic territory, on the other hand, natural obstacles are almost insurmountable and the routes actually take place only in the meridian direction along the rivers. The network of navigable waterways is very extensive (102,000 km, 72,000 of which in the European Union); Moscow is joint, the only city in the world, with 5 seas (Baltic, White, Black, Azov and Caspian). Civil aviation is also highly developed (about 29 million passengers, 2006), which has more than 1200 airports, 250 of which are suitable for large carriers. Moscow has 8 airports, four of which are international, and constitutes the most complex system. The main seaports are St. Petersburg on the Baltic, Novorossiysk on the Black Sea, Rostov on Don, Vladivostok on the Sea of Japan, Murmansk on the Barents Sea and Archangel on the White Sea. Foreign trade, which for years has been largely in surplus, sees Germany as the first partner, followed by China, Ukraine and Japan for imports and various European countries for exports.
