| Russia is a typical country with regional economic imparities.The drastic differences between eastern and western regions in economic and social development have severely hindered Russia's economic development.For a long time,European Russia,which takes up a mere one fourth of Russia's territory,has been the political,economic,and cultural center of the country and home to three fourths of Russia's industrial production and population.In contrast,Russian Far East,far from the center,has long been mired in sluggish economic development with low living standards and sparse population.Therefore,Russia has formulated and implemented the Russian Far East development strategy and associated regional economic policies,and prioritized Russian Far East development in its regional strategy.After the Ukrainian crisis,Russia has stepped up its support for Russian Far East development.It has been active in building an important passage to open itself up to Asia-Pacific region,hoping to boost economic development in Russian Far East with the help of the active Asia-Pacific economic circle and drive comprehensive development of Russian economy.In recent years,Northeast China,faced with increasingly slow economic growth,and its economy came under new downward pressure,and the grim situation of low level of openness,is in urgent need of in-depth reform and further opening-up,integrating itself into the Belt and Road Initiative,participating in building Northeast Asian economic circle,and accelerating the all-round revitalization of Northeast China.In this process,to strengthen the strategy alignment and interactive development between Northeast China and Russian Far East not only meets the demand of China-Russia economic cooperation and is also the only choice serving the interests of the two countries.Both Northeast China and Russian Far East are underdeveloped regions.In market economy,these two regions can hardly realize leapfrog development only with their own resource endowment.Macro-economic control and regional economic policies are pre-requisites to support and boost development in these two regions.Thisdissertation,studying the Russian Far East development strategies,has systematically analyzed the rules for revitalizing underdeveloped regions with sparse population and summarized the significance and strategies of international economic cooperation among underdeveloped regions.With a detailed review of Russian literature,this dissertation has made comprehensive and systematic analysis over the evolvement of development strategies in Russian Far East as well as policy orientation and effects.It serves as a reference for China to deepen its understanding towards economic policies in Russia,engage itself in Russian Far East development in a better manner,gain an in-depth integration with the Belt and Road Initiative,and speed up the development of Sino-Mongolian-Russian Economic Corridor and Polar Silk Road.It is also a reference for Northeast China to display its geographical advantages,open itself up further to the north,and construct a new platform for international cooperation.This dissertation has eight chapters.In Chapter ? and Chapter ?,the research background and significance as well as theoretical foundation were explained,research development of academic circles in both China and Russia over relevant issues was summarized,research thoughts,framework as well as methodology of this dissertation were introduced,and at last,the potential innovation and shortages of this dissertation were listed.In the theoretical foundation,the author reviewed theories of regional imparity,theories of regional development,and theories of cross-border development etc.,laying a theoretical foundation for research in this dissertation.In Chapter ?,the development potential of Russian Far East region in terms of geographical location,transportation,natural resources,mineral resources,industrial production,tourism and leisure etc.,as well as realities such as daunting demographic issues,backward infrastructure,simplistic industrial structure,and unbalanced development among Russia's federal subjects etc.,were analyzed,outlining the framework of basic conditions for Russian Far East development.From Chapter ? to Chapter ?,evolvement of development strategies in Russian Far East was sorted out,and policy orientation and effects of new development strategies in Russian Far East were analyzed as priorities.In Chapter ?,Russian Far East development strategies since the era of Soviet Union were chronologically divided into three stages: Russian Far East development strategy in the era of Soviet Union with balanced development as the basic principle(1917-1990),Russian Far East development strategy after the dissolution of Soviet Union with polarized development as the basic principle(1991-2008),and the new Russian Far East development strategy with coordinated progress and preemptive development as the basic principle(from 2009 to date).Undeniably,development strategy in the era of Soviet Union had once promoted,to some extent,economic development in Russian Far East in specific time periods,but the strategy also left Russian Far East with problems like a severely deformed industrial structure,over-reliance on heavy industries such as mineral industry,as well as severe population loss.Russian Far East development strategy after the dissolution of Soviet Union,due to the then domestic and international situation,had insufficient federal budget.Most of the regional economic policies didn't end up well,not even halfway executed and failing to deliver the expected results.As a result,Russian Far East region never managed to emerge from the economic backwardness.The new Russian Far East development strategy after 2009 focused the development expectation indicators that evaluate the policy execution on three perspectives such as economic acceleration,population and living standards,and investment.In the meantime,objective forecasts were made on the potential risks in policy execution,such as capital shortage,funding delays,growing immigration pressure,severe price shocks in global raw materials market,unsmooth self-regulation mechanism of the market,and drastic economic slowdown of Asia-Pacific countries etc.Effective measures were adopted with strenuous efforts to ensure the smooth execution of the Russian Far East development strategy.In Chapter ?,policy orientations of regional economic policies in the era of new Russian Far East development strategy were summarized as the following three aspects: Firstly,government management mechanism was changed into intensive and flat management mode to improve regulation efficiency;investment environment was improved and favorable tax policies were executed to build an effective platform to attract investment.Secondly,free land and living subsidies were provided on one hand to improve infrastructure,ensure livable environment,and attract immigrants from outside;on the other hand,childbirth was encouraged,medical and health conditions were improved,and educational and medical guarantees were provided to increase the natural population growth rate.Thirdly,efforts were made to build a forward-looking development zone and free port,agglomeration effect of industrieswas brought into full play,and foreign investment was attracted to boost employment,so as to realize leapfrog social-economic development.Chapter ? focuses on the evaluation of the Far East Development Strategy implementation based on case analysis.Firstly,dynamic trend of economic development in Russian Far East was analyzed in detail with comprehensive indicators of social-economic development such as total output value,investment,foreign trade,population,and employment,as well as development indicators of major industries such as mineral,agricultural,manufacturing,architectural and transportation industries.The author believes that Russian Far East had fast social-economic development since the execution of the new development strategy,but the economy still lacked vitality,optimization and adjustment of the industrial mix didn't have obvious effects,and demographic issues were still daunting.Secondly,difference in difference method was adopted to evaluate the new Russian Far East development strategy.The author concluded that the crude oil price,technological advances,and opening up to the outside world etc.were positively correlated with and contributed to the economic growth in Russian Far East;while infrastructure and estimated coefficient of government intervention were negatively correlated with and contained,to some extent,the economic growth in Russian Far East.We can see that on one hand,the Russian Far East region had inherent defects with its endowment in that it was over reliant on resources and its infrastructure still needed to be improved;on the other hand,Russia,given its current economic situation,is still powerless,in spite of its good intention,when it comes to the capital support for Russian Far East development.In fact,the most fundamental reason lies in market regulation.In market economy,market plays a decisive role in allocating resources.Macro control by the government is highly necessary but also limited to some extent.Therefore,we should abide by the rules of market economy and have rational attitude towards the effects of the Russian Far East development strategy.Thirdly,based on the above research results,this dissertation made an analysis over the main restrictive factors of the new Russian Far East development strategy,including fewer federal budgets,population loss,and insufficient labor forces due to international and domestic situation,backward transportation infrastructure,the still rigid mechanisms as well as corruption and indolence of government staff.In Chapter ?,the author noted that against the backdrop of Northeast Chinarevitalization being aligned with Russian Far East development strategy,the Belt and Road Initiative being aligned with Eurasian Economic Union,and development of China-Mongolia-Russia Economic Corridor and Polar Silk Road,the economic cooperation between Northeast China and Russian Far East offers unprecedented opportunities.The regional economic cooperation between the two sides has speeded up,and exchanges and cooperation in commodity trade,mineral resources,transportation,agriculture etc.have yielded remarkable results.However,we are also clearly aware that both Northeast China and Russian Far East are underdeveloped regions situated in economic periphery and low economic and technological gradient areas with low-level social-economic development.As the two regions still face challenges in upgrading industrial structure,improving technological innovation,and further opening up etc.,we need to have accurate comprehension of the interests and risks of their economic cooperation.While displaying the advantages of the two regions,we should be aware of the problems and difficulties and adopt effective measures to realize mutually beneficial,win-win and common development.Therefore,this dissertation has proposed concrete policy advices from the four perspectives: participating in Polar Silk Road development and building a new pattern of opening up;strengthening the coordination mechanism for policies and improving service support;innovating cooperation modes and improving cooperation efficiency;promoting technological innovation and deepening cultural exchanges etc.Chapter ?—Conclusion: the author summarized the research and analysis results,and made main conclusions for this dissertation. |
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