Читать книгу The Political Economy of the BRICS Countries - Группа авторов - Страница 68

Russia has undergone many changes since the collapse of socialism. It is now market based, participating in the global economy. Russia, however, has been depending heavily on the exploitation of its natural resources like oil, and hence its economic efficiency has suffered. In the BRICS group, Russia has the second lowest GDP after South Africa. Russia’s carbon dioxide emissions remain high as well. Russia has experienced growth in manufacturing industries and services, but still continues to remain vulnerable to global oil price fluctuations. Russia is also exposed to local and regional strife that often attracts international sanctions. On the social efficiency score, Russia is ranked second after Brazil. A large part of this social development is a remnant inherited from the socialist past — especially in the areas of education and health. Russia has had a relatively high per capita GDP and strong growth in wages and incomes. However, there remain disagreements about the source of this recent growth: whether it is from a strong economic base of industrialization, or whether it was due to the rising prices of oil and natural gas.

Russia is no longer a superpower and its economy has been slowing down in the recent past, primarily due to the sanctions against the nation imposed by EU as well as USA after the Ukraine crisis and the annexation of Crimea. Environmental problems like the melting of the permafrost and the sudden drought that decimated the wheat crop in 2010 and sent global wheat prices soaring are somewhat in line with the kind of problems faced by the other BRICS nations. However, political challenges are much more complex than those faced by the others in BRICS. Russia has also cracked down on NGOs doing work for social upliftment and environmental protection, treating them as foreign agents if they received international grants.

However, some good news still emerges out of Russia on the purely environmental front. Russia houses some of the world’s most important fisheries. The Walleye Pollock Fishery in the Sea of Okhotsk has earned the Marine Stewardship Council Sustainability Certification, and the cod fishery in the Barents Sea is being considered as a model of international cooperation. Forestry is another area that makes Russia particularly vulnerable to environmental degradation. About 45% of land in Russia contains 22% of the world’s total forest cover. Of this, 33 million hectares of forests have earned the Forestry Stewardship Certification for responsible forest management.