RURAL AREAS OF RUSSIA’S NORTH-WEST BORDERLAND: PROBLEMS AND DEVELOPMENT PATHS

This article focuses on the rural areas of Russia’s North-West borderlands, particularly, the municipal districts and towns that are closest to the national border. The study aims to identify problems in the development of these territories and provide solutions to them. The methodological framework employed is the neo-endogenous approach, which suggests the maximal multifunctionality-driven use of internal resources, bottom-up initiatives supported by the authorities, extensive use of innovations, the Internet, and scientific knowledge. The study takes into account and assesses the heterogeneity of rural areas by producing a typology of districts built on the structure of agricultural production, using the Hall-Tideman index. The study used several indicators to identify the role and place of border districts in their respective regions. Three types of districts were distinguished according to the structure of agricultural production: districts dominated by agricultural organisations, districts dominated by small farms, and mixed-type districts. Cross-district differences in output dynamics were described. The socially essential functions of rural areas and the economic entities performing those functions were identified. The analysis of the recreational resources of border districts helped to determine the directions in which the transformation of rural areas into consumer spaces was moving. The major development trajectories of rural areas were plotted using the non-endogenous approach and differentiated by the district types. The rural areas of the North-West borderlands were confirmed to have a unique and diverse resource potential that is sufficient to ensure their sustainable development based on the non-endogenous approach.


Introduction
Most rural areas of border districts are on the periphery, distant from the district centres or large industrial hubs. These areas have a low population density and their economic engagement is limited. They differ from mainland territories in various ways, including in terms of demography. Most border districts are depressed despite their numerous development resources.
A spate of recent articles [1-5, and others] has studied the borderlands of the Russian Federation. Most of these works, however, consider the phenom enon at the mesolevel and thus do not give a full picture. Few works examine the development of rural border areas at the microlevel, particularly, in North West Russia. As for the other regions, the literature focuses on transboundary cooperation mechanisms [6; 7].
Nowadays, when intergovernmental relations are complicated, and Russian borders are losing their contact functions, transboundary cooperation can hardly be considered as a factor in the development of rural border areas. Transbound ary regionbuilding at Russian borders is occurring rather slowly [8, p. 86]. For this reason, the study concentrates on the search for internal microlevel factors affecting the development of borderlands. To this end, it employs a range of available research approaches.
Agricultural economists link the problems of rural development with agri cultural production, while sociologists link them with the formation of human and social capital. At the same time, geographers view rural areas through the lens of settlement patterns evolution paying attention to urban residents' exurb gardening communities, rural recreation, and 'dacha studies' [21][22][23]. An in teresting case is Ugorskiy Proekt (the Ugric Project), which monitors rural life with immersion in the social environment of the village [22]. Many geographi cal studies are interdisciplinary [17; 20; 22], which proves to be beneficial. Nev ertheless, the majority of rural studies are discipline-specific with specialists in different fields using different methodological approaches as well as incompat ible terminological and conceptual frameworks.
Rural development is systemically studied across the world with a plethora of articles published on the subject. The Rural Planning and Development col lection provides an overview of 'the key concepts of rural development with a broad range of representative published sources included' [25]. In recent de cades, international literature has discussed the paradigm shift in rural develop ment and the search for new avenues within the discipline [26]. This trend has been, to some extent, embraced by Russian researchers [15; 16]. Many of them insist on replacing the exogenous approach, which relies on external factors, with the endogenous one, which makes maximum use of local resources. The latter places emphasis on spatial planning rather than on industrial rural devel opment, with all that that entails [27].
The scientific search for new avenues for rural development continues. The earlier concept of nonendogenous development is being revised [28]. Special attention is being paid to place branding [29], the multifunctionality of rural areas [30; 31], the 'rural web' concept [26; 32], and the role of social capital in rural development [32; 33].
The literature also considers other aspects of rural development addressed below. Emphasis is put on agricultural production, which remains the key indus try in the territory that is home to 80 % of the population of the northwestern borderlands.
This study aims to identify problems in rural development in Russia's northwestern borderlands and search for ways to solve them in the near future.
It aims to achieve the following objectives: 1. to determine how border districts perform on selected key indicators at the regional level; 2. to identify the socially significant functions of rural areas; 3. to explore the inhomogeneity of rural areas as regards their production performance; 4. to search for marketing decisions aimed to unlock the nonproductive functions of rural areas; 5. to outline promising avenues for rural development in the near future.

Methodology
The study employs a nonendogenous approach to rural development, which suggests bottomup mobilisation of border districts' internal resources and top down support for local initiatives. It views rural areas as consumer spaces, em ploys the concepts of multifunctionality and place branding, as well as exploits innovations, the Internet, and scientific knowledge.
The study relies on Rosstat data, the author's previous research results, in formation available online, and theoretical findings of Russian and international experts.
In describing agricultural production inhomogeneity across rural areas, the study uses a district typology based on the HallTideman index measuring the concentration of agricultural production for agricultural organisations, farms, and private households [34].
Another method employed along with the method of typology is the gener alisation. The resultant index, which demonstrates the effect of inhomogeneity on rural development, comprises the coefficients of average annual agricultural production growth rate in constant prices. Border districts account for over onethird of the area and 24 % of the pop ulation of their regions. Their population density is below the regional average (table 1). Table 1 The regional ranking of border districts by area, rural population, and its density, as of January 1, 2019

Russian region
Border districts as a proportion of the regional total,% The Kaliningrad region stands out, as its border district accounts for half of its territory and over 40 % of its rural population. The region's rural population density is the highest in Russia's NorthWest.
As to agricultural production, the ranking of border districts is determined by arable land, crop area, and agricultural output (table 2). Table 2 The share of border districts in the regional arable land area, crop area, and agricultural production across all types of economic entities,% In the regions under study, border districts account for about a third of arable land, crop area, and agricultural output in their respective regions. The Kaliningrad region makes the greatest contribution to this proportion. It com prises 63 % of all arable land and a third of agricultural output in NorthWest Russia.
When comparing tables 1 and 2, it is clear that, while home to 24 % of the rural population, border districts produce a third of regional agricultural goods. Therefore, rural border areas have an important role in regional agricultural pro duction. The indices demonstrate a tendency towards a growing contribution of border districts to agricultural output in their regions and a reducing share of the arable land and crop area. At the same time, land use is becoming increasingly efficient.

The multifunctionality of rural areas
The term 'place function' was coined by the eminent geographers Aleksey Mints and Vladimir Preobrazhensky in 1970. They defined the 'place function' as a part of geographical space that has or can have a certain function in the life of society and thus meets, or is capable of meeting, a certain need of a society, its part, or a person [35, p. 120]. According to Mints and Preobrazhensky, a place can perform a variety of functions either simultaneously or consecutively [ibid], i.e. it can be multifunctional.
In the USSR, the idea of multifunctionality was first applied to rural areas in 1980 by Tatyana Zaslavskaya, Rozalina Ryvkina, and other researchers. They proposed to distinguish the functions of population replacement and control over the territory along with the production function of rural areas [36].
The contemporary nonendogenous approach to rural development uses the concept of multifunctionality when exploring rural areas: these territories are viewed from the perspective of productive and social functions. At the same time, rural areas are considered as consumer spaces, whose products have usevalue and can be sold.
Russian researchers have considered in detail the problem of agriculture and rural areas [11][12][13]; one of the publications summarises the existing approaches [15, p. 7].
In this research, rural border areas are deemed to have production, demo graphic, social, recreational, and ecological functions; they also fulfil the func tions of control over the territory, of maintaining natural and cultural landscapes, and of preserving the historical and cultural heritage in rural areas.
For borderlands with borderzone restrictions on movement and economic activities, the control function has both special features and a particular sig nificance.
The agricultural production function of rural areas is fulfilled by the tradi tional categories of economic entities: agricultural organisations (AO), farms (F), and private households (PH); whereas the forestry production function is carried out by logging companies (LC). This function is also performed by business structures across various fields of material production that rely on lo cal resources.  (table 3).
The performance of the production function by economic entities depends on both the demand for the relevant products and the availability of resources in rural areas.

The production function of rural areas. Border district differentiation
To study the production function of rural areas, there was a typology of bor der districts developed based on production concentration indices for each eco nomic entity type and the structure of agricultural production.
This typology is the key to evaluating the situation and providing a rationale for rural development options. Each of the categories has a particular set of char acteristics: scale, intensity, marketability, and production competitiveness. The concentration of a category in a certain territory determines how people live and how production and the social sphere are organised there.
Calculation of the Hall-Tideman index and generalisation of the results al lowed to identify three types of districts depending on the parameters of agricul tural production: AOdominated (type I); F and PHdominated (type II); mixed (type III).
This district typology shows that the areas of rural territories and the rural population are divided almost in equal proportions between types I and III, which account for 31.5 % and 84.5 % of the total respectively (table 4). Agricultural production in the districts under study has different development trends (see figure). In type I districts, agricultural output increased threefold over the study pe riod. Their contribution to the borderland total shifted by 21 percentage points, whereas the specific weight of type III and II districts decreased by 5 percentage points.
Most of the output growth in type I districts was accounted for by large hold ing companies specialising in pig breeding and fattening as well as egg produc tion. Unfortunately, high output growth rates achieved through economies of scale have an adverse effect on rural areas as production concentrates locally. 3. In the NorthWest, large pig and poultry breeding companies use concen trated feed with most of its grain components produced outside the region. Local lands are not involved in economic circulation; this impedes the development of contiguous rural areas.
Agricultural production in type II districts, most of which are found in the Republic of Karelia, is declining. Without targeted measures, small farms, which constitute the core of agricultural production and have a prominent role in creat ing jobs and providing rural residents with incomes, will continue to reduce their output.
In type III districts, agricultural production is slightly increasing; most of this growth is accounted for by the agricultural organisations that are the backbone of private households and farms. The literature suggests that AOdominated type III areas are associated with greater development opportunities for smaller economic entities than type II districts, where AOs are almost absent. A rational combina tion of AO, F, and PH in the production structure creates good conditions for rural areas to perform production functions as well as generates an environment for the development of these territories.
The border districts of the Republic of Karelia and the Murmansk and Pskov regions have a low potential for development through agricultural production. These districts, however, have various resources that can transform under certain conditions into a powerful impetus for rural development attained by implement ing nonproductive functions.

Non-productive functions of rural areas
Most nonproductive functions involve the same resources and organisations. The recreational function, which includes spa treatment, tourism, amateur sports, amateur fishing, dacha recreation and gardening, takes advantage of the consum er properties and/or historical and cultural objects.
Most natural tourist attractions are conservation areas, which perform the eco logical function as well as the functions of natural landscape maintenance and of control over the territory. Rural areas are home to many historical and cultural objects, some of which are cultural heritage sites (CHS).
The key function is the recreational one. It binds together all nonproductive functions and introduces natural and historicalcultural values into the consumer space. Therefore, this function should utilise the geographical image of a territory.
When discussing a territory as a consumer space, contemporary authors (par ticularly economists) employ the concepts of image and brand without exploring the geographical image.
However, such studies should adopt the following scheme: the geographical image → image → brand.
In responding to the absence of the first element, Irina Vazhenina proposed a category of 'territorial individuality', which she defines as 'the general sum of characteristics that distinguish one territory from another' [37, p. 149].
In my opinion, this new category is superfluous since it falls within the scope of the concept of the geographical image, which is defined as the sum of charac teristics that clearly and concisely describe a territory and are expressed in signs, symbols, stereotypes, and key ideas [38; 39].
Vazhenina defines the place image as a 'totality of feelings and figurative, emotional ideas that people have about nature, climate, history, ethnography, socioeconomic, aspects, politics, mentality, and other characteristics of that ter ritory' [37, p. 154].
In their definition of the image, Ovchinnikov et al. [40, p. 102] refer to qual itative characteristics of a territory (along with its distinctive features). This un derstanding is very close to the concept of geographical image accepted in the general system of place branding.
Some works identify the geographical image with the image [41]. This ap proach does not seem justified.
The definitions of the geographical image and the place image suggest that these concepts are not to be confused: the former reflects an objectively de scribed reality, whereas the latter is an ITinduced subjective perception of that reality. The place image does not turn a territory into a consumer space albeit contributes to such a transformation.
The next stage is the place brand, which is a 'generalised image that is clearly identifiable among other territories; it is based on actual advantages positioned in the image field' [40, p. 103].
This and other definitions suggest that the brand is a product of a positive place image that reflects the originality and uniqueness of a territory and serves as a stereotype affecting the consumer's choice of tourism, recreation, and other services.
The northwestern border districts boast substantial natural and histori calcultural resources. These resources are necessary for rural areas to perform nonproductive functions, develop imagebuilding tourism and recreation infra structure, create place brands, and generate consumer spaces that reflect certain aspects of the geographical image of rural areas (Table 5).  Table 5 provides a general idea of the nonproductive image of rural areas. The aggregate measures relating to natural and culturalhistorical objects say nothing about the inner inhomogeneity of the latter. The structuring of aggregate measures makes place images even more multifaceted.
Apparently, the geographical image of rural areas comprises both zonal and azonal phenomena. As a rule, the former are of natural and the latter of histori calcultural origin. This provided the basis for juxtaposing the geographical im ages typical of border districts with current image characteristics and thus facili tated the first step towards analysing emerging place brands. Table 6 shows some of the results obtained. Table 6 The geographical images, image-building objects, and emerging brands of the borderland rural districts of North Karelia and Lake Peipus districts in the Pskov region  Table 6 and those not included) have a sufficient image potential to fulfil the nonproductive functions of rural areas causing them to evolve into consumer spaces with specific place brands.

Many borderland districts of Russia's NorthWest (both those included in
Dachafocused recreation may have an important role here. Its principal ob jects are dacha communities and villages with urban residents' 'second homes'. The data of the 2016 Russian agricultural census (2016 RAC) suggest that, in the northwestern borderlands, gardening and dacha communities are strongly localised (table 7). dening communities concentrate near the regional capital, in the Bagrationovsk district, whose gardening plots comprise 86 % of the regional total.
Borderland districts account for 28. When applied to a concrete border district type, general trajectories of rural development assume specific characteristics.
In type I districts, there is a need for environmental protection and conserva tion measures. It is necessary to prevent further concentration of production facil ities and create conditions for the development of small and medium agricultural organisations, farms, and private households.
Type II districts have to tackle unemployment associated with reduced log ging and agricultural activities. There are two possible solutions to the problem.
One is the comprehensive use of forest resources, including timber, wild plants (mushrooms, berries, herbs) and commercial animal species. The other is the cre ation of place images and brands based on the nonproductive functions of rural territories.
Type III districts should pay special attention to the agricultural organisations that do not produce sufficient agricultural output growth rates. Agricultural or ganisations create important social goods: they contribute to the development of smaller economic entities (particularly, farms) and the fulfilment of such func tions as control over the territory, agricultural landscape maintenance as well as social functions. Therefore, in type III districts, agricultural organisations require full support. The role of farms in the development of these territories will be growing. An increase in the number of farms creates conditions favourable to the emergence of agricultural consumer cooperatives, which are an important rural development institution.
In the districts that have major recreational facilities, it is important to pro mote a corresponding image. Such areas with the already existing image should build a place brand facilitating the evolution of rural territories into consumer spaces. The above has particular significance for the districts that have been los ing their productive functions.
Bottomup initiatives may appear and succeed in border districts if the federal and regional authorities create necessary conditions. The rural areas of those dis tricts require special regimes for investment attraction, innovation, and business development. These regimes should be adopted using a procedure similar to free economic zone mechanisms.

Conclusion
The article provides a microleveloverview of rural development in the northwestern borderlands to identify possible trajectories of locallydriven de velopment.
The results obtained suggest that the areas under study have a versatile and unique resource potential that is sufficient for their sustainable development based on a nonendogenous approach.
The 'frontline' districts of the northwestern borderlands account for a third of their regions' areas, 24 % of the regions' population, over 30 % of the arable lands, and a third of the total agricultural produce. Rural areas fulfil a number of nonproductive functions: recreation (including tourism), environmental protec tion, control over the territory, and others.
Rural areas differ in the structure of agricultural production. Three types of districts are distinguished: those dominated by agricultural organisations (25 %), by smaller economic entities (33 %), and by both (42 %). The study identified the problems characteristic of each type and outlined the ways to solve them.
To activate the nonproductive functions of the rural areas, it was proposed to explore their geographical images, identify imagebuilding objects and potential brands, and take measures to promote the latter. All of the above will facilitate the transformation of rural areas into consumer spaces.
The article deliberately did not consider transboundary cooperation, which requires a special investigation. Nor did it consider the demographic function of the rural border areas: a mesolevel study was carried out by Gennady M. Fedor ov [1], whereas the available information is insufficient for micro-level research.