THE SOVIET OIL INDUSTRY IN THE TWELFTH FIVE-YEAR PLAN

The article briefly considers the question of conservation and oil displacement in recent years. It then focuses on the problem of petroleum supplies, on the factors affecting their expansion, and on Soviet efforts and plans in the field. Investment growth in the oil industry and its regional allocation in the 1980s and beyond are examined. The nature and thrust of the exploratory effort, its relationship to the new reserve classifications, and to prospects for the Soviet oil industry are analyzed. Finally, the causes of the current rebound in output and Soviet plans for field development are assessed.     

CONTROL OF RESOURCES AND THE RECENT DEVELOPMENT OF THE PETROCHEMICAL INDUSTRY IN ALBERTA

Recent petrochemical developments in Alberta are part of a global redistribution of the industry toward raw material locations. A small group of companies has secured control of these raw materials within Alberta and, as a consequence, the power to determine the future pattern of petrochemical development within the province. This pattern will reflect the requirements of the companies rather than the economic policy objectives of the Alberta government.
Les développements récents dans ľindustrie de la pétrochimie en Alberta font partie ďune redistribution globale de ľindustrie vers ses sources de matières premières. Un petit groupe de sociétés a réussi à prendre le contrle de ces matières premières en Alberta, et, par conséquent, le pouvoir de déterminer les directions dans lesquelles ľindustrie pétrochimique évoluera dans cette province. Dans une telle situation, la politique économique du gouvernement de ľAlberta cèdra la place aux besoins prioritaires déterminés par les sociétés elles-měmes.     

PROSPECTS FOR SOVIET GAS EXPORTS: OPPORTUNITIES AND CONSTRAINTS

This paper assesses the prospects for Soviet gas exports to Western Europe, analyzing both supply (domestic) factors, such as gas production, consumption, and transportation, and demand (foreign) factors such as gas demand and market share. This is done using a network allocation model of the Soviet gas pipeline network (for 1985, 1990, and 1995) and a country-by-country analysis of the gas market in Western Europe. In general, the outlook for increased gas exports to Western Europe, at least to the turn of the century, is rather bleak. This is mainly due to a relatively slower rate of growth of gas demand in Western Europe than projected earlier, coupled with overcontracting of gas supplies, because the USSR has enormous gas reserves, ample production, and no major pipeline bottlenecks restricting export volumes. Its huge pipeline construction program allows both domestic consumption and exports to be comfortably accommodated     

长征中的中华苏维埃共和国国家银行

七十多年前中国工农红军长征的途中,中国革命的金融工作者也同红军战士一样进行了英勇的斗争。他们除了行军打仗外,在极其艰难的条件下还进行了大量的经济、金融工作,特别是利用有利时机适时发行苏维埃国家银行纸币,为迅速补充红军给养,促进部队战斗力的恢复做出了贡献。     

THE 1929 MEETING OF SOVIET GEOGRAPHY TEACHERS: A KEY EVENT IN THE HISTORY OF SOVIET ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY

A Soviet economic geographer who participated in a 1929 conference of geography teachers describes the antecedents, the atmosphere and the proceedings of this crucial meeting in a stormy period of the discipline. It was a landmark in the history of Soviet economic geography in marking the beginning of the end of the old sectoral-statistical approach and inaugurating the new regional school led by N. N. Baranskiy.     

SPATIAL PATTERNS OF HIGHER EDUCATION IN THE SOVIET UNION

Analysis of spatial patterns of attained educational levels is helpful in understanding the cultural geography of an area, perhaps especially in the Soviet Union, with its many ethnic groups and stated aim of providing equality of education regardless of ethnicity or sex. The proportion of the population that had completed a higher education was mapped at oblast level from 1970 census data. High rates are found in certain urban areas, Estonia and Latvia, Georgia, and certain sparsely populated areas of the Far North, Siberia, and the Far East. There are regional patterns of disparity between male and female rates of completed higher education and between rural and urban rates, despite Soviet attempts to reduce these inequalities. The distribution of Soviet higher educational institutions conforms generally to the distribution of population, although access to higher education opportunities appears to be geographically limited in some regions. (Maps by Joann L. Krupa, George Mason University.)     

LOCATIONAL FACTORS OF MACHINE MANUFACTURING IN THE SOVIET NORTH

Arguments are marshaled against the location of machine manufacturing in the North. The location of suppliers and the location of the market are viewed as negligible factors because machinery plants generally are supplied from a large number of sources and serve a highly dispersed market. The crucial element is said to be the issue of labor resources, particularly skilled labor, and the associated infrastructure that would be needed in the North. It is also pointed out that machine manufacturing is traditionally most cost-effective in large urban centers and in older industrial areas where it benefits from the so-called agglomerative effect of locational factors. It is recommended that metal-fabricating activities in the North be restricted to essential equipment repairs and overhauls and occasional manufacture of nonstandard equipment, with greater use of centralized supplies of spare parts. (For an opposed view, see V. P. Yevstigneyev in Soviet Geography, May 1976.)     

THE SYSTEM OF PROTECTED NATURAL AREAS IN THE USSR AND PROSPECTS FOR ITS DEVELOPMENT

The International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources has developed a 10-category system for classifying the world's protected natural areas. The present article by two Soviet biogeographers, presented at Unesco's “Man and the Biosphere” conference in Minsk in 1983, analyzes the way in which the Soviet Union's protected areas fall into the classification system devised by the International Union. The article also discusses the types of protected areas found in the USSR, and the functions assigned to each. (The translation is by Philip R. Pryde, San Diego State University.)     

SOVIET ASIAN-PACIFIC TRADE AND THE REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT OF THE SOVIET FAR EAST

During the 1970s and early 1980s it was generally accepted, by both Soviet and Western specialists, that in the Soviet Far East the expansion of exports to the nations of the Pacific Basin offered a solution to the region's economic problems. However, recent policy statements suggest the rejection of this export-led development strategy. This study examines the changing structure and dynamics of Soviet trade with the Asian-Pacific region. At present, for a combination of economic and political reasons, Soviet trade with the Asian-Pacific region is dominated by exports of machinery and equipment and petroleum to the socialist nations of the region, inasmuch as Japanese demand for Soviet natural resources is stagnant. Therefore, because of the resource orientation of the Far Eastern economy, contemporary trade relations do not favor the expansion of the Soviet Far Eastern export base. Consequently, the future role of the region in the national economic system will be determined largely by the availability of domestic capital investment funds.     

REGIONAL PATTERNS OF MEDICAL CARE AVAILABILITY IN THE FORMER SOVIET UNION

This paper analyzes patterns of change in the regional availability of medical care resources in the former Soviet Union for selected years from 1940 to 1989 by examining the relationships among the supplies of physicians, mid-level medical personnel, and hospital beds. Data from economic handbooks, the 1989 health handbook, and unpublished Goskomstat USSR statistics are used to construct composite (ratio) indices of medical care availability for oblast-level units. Maps of these indices reveal that distinct medical resources regions existed in the former Soviet Union in 1989.     

ISSUES IN THE REGIONALIZATION OF INDUSTRY IN THE SOCIALIST COUNTRIES OF EASTERN EUROPE

A hierarchy of industrial areas in Eastern Europe is described, consisting of 40 industrial regions, about 200 industrial nodes, and numerous industrial centers and ordinary industrial places. Evidence of the formation of a higher-ranking industrial macroregion covering the border area of East Germany, Poland and Czechoslovakia is adduced. Six other entities of industrial macroregion rank are identified in the rest of Europe (including the European USSR east to the Urals).     

THE LAW OF ONE PRICE IN A NETWORK: ARBITRAGE AND PRICE DYNAMICS IN NATURAL GAS CITY GATE MARKETS*

ABSTRACT. In this paper we develop a model of the law of one price in a network where many markets are linked with a structure of paths. We show that arbitrage-free prices depend on the structure of the network and so do price dynamics. Our estimates indicate that local bypass and open access pipeline transportation were instrumental in opening arbitrage paths to natural gas city markets and causing their prices to converge. Spot markets in the city gates, pipeline hubs, and production fields, that are scattered over distant points in the vast pipeline network in the United States, now form a single market.