Remaking the Russian map
The Russian government and presidential administration will propose to turn the country’s 83 federal subjects into 20 giant super-regions, government sources reveal.
According to three government officials, a major Russian territorial reform is in the pipeline. The reform will turn today’s 83 federal subjects into 20 new giant super regions, they told newspaper Vedomosti. This urban agglomeration – the extension of Russian cities – will enable the country to overcome the problems of mono-industrial complexes and facilitate the generation of investments and economic growth.
A document elaborated by government reportedly calls for an “institutionalization of migration” from villages and smaller towns to regional urban centres with more than one million people.
If the plans are implemented, practically all of Northwest Russia will be included in a super-region ruled from Sankt Petersburg.
The territorial division of Russia has been a returning issue ever since the country adopted its constitution in 1993. Then, the country had 89 federal subjects. Today, the number is down to 83 following several regional mergers. After coming to power in year 2000, Vladimir Putin introduced seven federal provinces (okrugs), the number of which this year was increased to eight. The Northwest Russian Federal District includes eleven federal subjects and is administered from Sankt Petersburg.
In Northwest Russia, several regional mergers have been discussed, among them the merging of Arkhangelsk Oblast with the Nenets Autonomous Okrug and Sankt Petersburg with Leningrad Oblast. As reported by BarentsObserver, the former two regions have come a long way towards a merger, although they formally still exist as two separate territories.
