SPATIAL DEVELOPMENT OF THE GRAIN INDUSTRY IN THE REGIONS OF RUSSIA

Currently, the spatial organization of grain production in the regions and in the country as a whole is one of the key organizational and economic factors, the accounting and implementation of which does not require large-scale one-time costs, allows to increase the profitability of the grain industry, reliably ensure the grain supply of the country, its food security. At the same time, despite a number of measures taken by the state to develop agriculture and regulate agricultural products, raw materials and food markets, distortions in their spatial organization persist in many regions. In the country, the number of regions characterized by low coefficients of specialization for certain types of grain in 2023 ranges from 71 to 88%, and with a high coefficient from 12 to 29%. The main grain production is concentrated in five macroregions of the country: the Southern macroregion accounts for 27.6% of all-Russian production, the Central Chernozem region -16.7, the Volga-Ural region -14.1, the North Caucasus region – 9.1, and the South Siberian region - 7.4%. The following trends are characteristic of the dynamics of the spatial development of grain production: the spatial development of grain production in all macroregions was characterized by growing trends, but the leaders among them were the five above-mentioned macroregions, the number of regions increased significantly (from 18 in 2014 up to 27 in 2023), which produced more than one ton of grain per capita, accounting for 81.3% of gross harvests and 84.6% of grain crops in the country; in some regions (Ryazan, Rostov regions, Kabardino-Balkarian Republic, Karachay-Cherkess Republic, etc.) there is an excessive concentration of grain crops (up to 70% and above, while in others there are trends of despecialization; There is a certain movement of crops of certain types of grain crops to the southeastern and eastern grain-producing regions, which increases the likelihood of instability in grain production due to the high aridity of the climate.