Investor Presentaiton
20 Leonid B. Vardomskiy
deputies of the City Council, 18 were managers (nine directors of industrial
enterprises, six doctors and three school principals).
In view of the significant superiority of left-wing forces - CPRF support
never falls below 25% of all voters - the political preferences of the population in
different regions of the oblast differ significantly. (Table 4)
As a result, the first and the second place in the elections were shared
between the Communists and the ruling party, Unity. The Shatsk region, where
the electoral bloc OVR took the second place from Unity, was the only exception.
The number of CPRF supporters is lower in areas with high urban population
(such as the municipalities of Ryazan and Kasimov, Rybnovski region with the
city of Rybnoe, Pronski region with the city of Novomichurinsk). The Klepikovsk,
Putyatin and Starozhilov regions belong to the same category. The number of
CPRF supporters is the highest in remote rural regions (Sasov, Saraev, Miloslavsk
and Pitelinsk regions - in each of these, the number of CPRF supporters exceeds
40%; in Kadomsk, Korablin, Sapozhkovsk, Spassk and Chukovsk regions, and
also in the municipalities of Sasovo and Skopin, the CPRF regularly wins over
35% of the vote).
The character of the oblast economy with its high degree of integration of
energy and military enterprises into inter-regional contacts, together with the
mentality of the population, practically precludes any tendencies towards sepa-
ratism. One can say that despite the difficult social situation, Ryazan Oblast rep-
resents a bastion for strengthening the Russian statehood. At the same time, the
main political forces see the liberal market policies of the federal center as the pri-
mary threat to the oblast. They tend to attribute the demographic crisis, poverty,
communal problems, and power outages to such policies. The majority of politi-
cal elites speaks in favor of supporting national producers; they are against the
dictate of natural and regional monopolies and are in favor of strengthening state
regulation in the economy.
International contacts of the oblast
year
Foreign trade ties of the oblast showed contradictory dynamics up until the
2000. The volume of exports was shrinking up until 1998, reflecting the state of
Ryazan PPP as the main exporter and the fluctuations of the ruble exchange rate.
From 1998, exports began to grow, with a rapid increase in 2000. However, the
imports, after having reached their maximum level in 1996, have been consis-
tently shrinking. The foreign trade balance of the oblast was negative in 1996;
however, in 1997-2000 it grew from US$81.5 million to US$493 million.
Table 5:
Foreign trade balance for the period 1997-2000, in millions of dollars
exports
imports
balance
1995
294
114
408
1996
229
253
482
1997
202.7
121.2
323.9
1998
217.0
92.1
309.1
1999
288.7
71.3
360.0
2000
560.3
67.5
627.8
(Data supplied by Ryazan customs)
In 2000, petroleum and petroleum products accounted for over 83% of exports, a
growth rate of 11% over 1999. Other significant exports were measurement
equipment (3.3%), raw aluminum (2.6%), and synthetic fibers (2.1%).
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