Russia’s Agroindustrial Regions: Concept, Approaches to Identification, and Results

Abstract

The article summarizes the first stage of a fairly large study to acquire new knowledge on the influence of traditional regional development factors (specialization of the economy and central–peripheral position of the region) on the development of territorial socioeconomic systems in modern conditions. A general idea is given of agroindustrial regions as a special type of territorial socioeconomic systems with their inherent economic specialization, character of settlement system, and quality and way of life, largely due to “inherited” developmental features. A scientifically based methodology for distinguishing Russian agroindustrial regions is proposed. The procedure for forming the feature space is described in detail, and the requirements for each indicator and their system as a whole are given. This methodology was tested on Russian regions. Two groups of closely related indicators were formed that reveal the orientation of Russian regions toward the development of industry and agriculture. A typology of regions in a two-dimensional space was plotted, the main axes of which are the degree of agrarian and industrial orientation of the region. The territorial and sectoral structure of the Russian economy is revealed, and the circle of agroindustrial regions is delineated. Our results are correlated with those of earlier similar studies.