How large is the manufacturing sector in Russia?
Question
How large is the manufacturing sector in Russia?
This question was asked as part of our webinar on Russia which can be found at:
https://opentoexport.com/webinars/beyond-the-eu-russia/
Answer
It depends what measure.
In 2014, the Russian rouble fell to a third of its previous value, now restored to about half. So imports crashed. Import substitution has been building slowly.
Measured in dallers since the 2014 devaluation, Russian manufacturing compares with Spain or Turkey but with significantly larger heavy engineering and defence sectors, fewer washing machines. Measured by number of enterprises it is more like Italy. By number of employees more like Germany. I suggest that you think of it as comparable to Italy.
However, unlike most high income countries, manufacturing is growing, aided by the devaluation. Some sectors are doing better than others. Food processing is booming. Automotive is recovering from a 60% drop in sales (which particularly affected imports) and a huge rise in the cost of credit.