DEVELOPMENT AND TERRITORIAL DIFFERENCES OF AGRICULTURE IN THE KALININGRAD REGION

Abstract

The patterns of development and distribution of production, including agricultural production, common to the country, are also characteristic of the exclave Kaliningrad region. However, spatial isolation from other Russian regions causes, firstly, a greater dependence on external geoeconomic and geopolitical factors and, secondly, a clearer manifestation of the patterns of spatial differentiation in the economy. Research methods are based on the spatio-temporal analysis of statistical data, using methods of comparative geographic diagnostics. The article shows a deeper decline in agricultural production in the region during the crisis years of the 1990s and increased rates of development in more favorable decades of the 21st century, as well as an acute manifestation of the polarization concepts and location of agricultural production within a separate territory compared to the country’s interior regions. The study which relied on the level of agricultural development and specialization of the territory of the region, the degree of use of land and labor resources in crop production, animal husbandry, hunting and the provision of services in these areas, substantiated to distinguish four types of municipalities according to the factors of agricultural development. Given each type, the author noted the need for a special socio-economic policy.