Abstract
Autore:
Iannini Giuseppe, Galbani Alessandro
Titolo:
"La Russia e lo spazio eurasiatico. Un’integrazione compiuta?"
The initiative of establishing a Custom Union extended to
the ex-Soviet countries of Central Asia is a core step of
the Russian strategy aimed at regaining influence in those
lost territories. It may be considered a functional
extension of Eurasec (Economic Community comprising Russia,
Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan), founded in
2000 as successor of previous ineffective organizations
(CSI, 1996). The Eurasec Custom Union, formed in 2008, was
implemented in 2010 among the Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan
“troika” and has marked an important goal in the
Organization’s path. The article runs upon the difficulties
that such supranational association meets both in fostering
trade relations and in facilitating economic and industrial
development of the member countries. The disproportion of
the Russian economy compared to that of the Central Asian
States and the uneven economic weight of these countries
within the Central Asian region (oil and non-oil countries)
originates the unbalanced trade relations between them.
Therefore, virtuous effects of trade creation and trade
diversion are hardly statistically evident as well positive
spill over of industrial innovation and diversification do
not seem to appear up to the present. Moreover, the actual
serious stalemate of Russian economy, due both to the
economic sanctions and to the plummeted rouble, are alarming
Kazakhstan (a formal member country), Armenia and Kyrgyzstan
(the other two countries eventually interested to enter the
Custom Union). This grey landscape bolsters the Chinese
activism in the region, as Central Asian states find much
easier to get on with Beijing than with Moscow. In so far as
Moscow hesitates in speeding up the economic reforms and
deeply modernizing its productive system, hardly will be
able to be attractive for the Near Abroad.
