Opening address of editor-in-chief.

Even in conditions of reduced funding for scientific research the staff of academic institutions do not give up and do not sit idle. This is proved by personal example of the president of the Russian Academy of Sciences academician V.E. Fortov, founder of the scientific direction “dynamic physics of nonideal plasma”, studying strong shock waves and extreme states of substances. Such experiments are not at all cheap, but absolutely necessary for our country’s development. Special columnist of the “ES” magazine Natalia Leskova talks to Vladimir Evgenievich Fortov about why this is so and what the fundamental science is needed for.

The article presents results of modeling the consequences of a large asteroid’s catastrophic collision with the Earth. They confirm the necessity of concrete steps to create a means of protection against the asteroid-comet danger that threatens the very existence of mankind. Undertaken analysis of the situation in the field of space threat prevention proves that alongside with ensuring national and international security, they will contribute to developing many spheres of the state and humanity activities, including defense, civil defense and protection, science, technology, economics, politics, etc. Russian project of creating an international planetary protection system “Citadel” can serve as a basis for creating means of planetary protection. This is confirmed by inclusion of the Citadel project in the New Manhattan Project, proposed by the World Federation of Scientists.

The generation of winners goes down in history. A year ago, one of the outstanding military scientists of the twentieth century passed from this life. Anatoly Ivanovich Savin was an academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, scientific supervisor of JSC “Concern VKO “Almaz-Antey”, Hero of Socialist Labor, coryphaeus of the national defense industry complex. His name stands in line with the names of Kurchatov, Korolev, Keldysh, although it is not so well known. There are people whose contribution to the emerging and development of the Russian defense industry could not be overestimated. There are mentors, without whom it is impossible to imagine the history of the country. There are persons about whom, instead of short memorabilia, it is necessary to write a full book. All this could be told about Academician Savin. The meaning of all of its production and scientific activities was to realize the idea of maintaining a strategic equilibrium in the world, preventing global disasters and the possibility of imitating any armed conflict, especially between nuclear powers. The creation of guided jet weapons in the 1950’s, global space information and information management systems in 60’s – 70’s of the twentieth century are behind him. Trivial question, what he loves most in life, he used to meet with a laconic and simple answer: “Life!”.

The regular meeting of the Association “Analytics” for promoting analytical potential of the Individual, Society and the State, held on April 17, 2017 in the RF Chamber of Commerce and Industry, was dedicated to a very important issue — production of civilian and dual-purpose products by enterprises of the defense-industry complex. Discussions at the highest level proved that different solutions are possible here, and the expert-industrial community has got a feeling that now it’s high time to work out a point of view that should be scientifically based and at the same time should rely on the industry’s vision of these problems. The last thing should be repeating experience of the 1980–1990s in this sphere. As there are rapid changes occurring in the technological order, technologies are developing, foreign policy environment and the militarypolitical situation are extremely risky, we must somehow try to foresee the future, realizing that it is almost impossible.

The regular meeting of the Bogomolov Club, held on April 10, 2017 in the RAS Institute for Economic Strategies was dedicated to discussing the current climate changes and their impact on the population and economy of Russia through various natural disasters and catastrophes.

As evidenced by the economic theory, as well as by practical experience in our country and abroad, the key condition for overcoming the stagflation decline of the Russian economy is rapid and significant increase in investments by 30-50%. According to the RAS Institute of Economic Forecasting, the level of 5% annual increase in GDP can be achieved with an increase in the accumulation rate up to the target value set by the President of the Russian Federation at 27% of GDP by 2018. To catch up with the growth rate of the Chinese economy and to ensure the average growth rates, declared by the head of state, above the world average, the accumulation rate should be increased up to 35%. To this end, the annual growth of investments in fixed assets should be not less than 20%. The existing production facilities, occupied by half in engineering and construction, allow this. At the same time, economic growth will be achieved through increasing efficiency of the primary resources use as a result of introducing new technologies, increasing the level of primary commodities processing, advanced growth of mechanical engineering and due to production of a new technological order. The latter, provided its dynamic upgrading on an advanced technological basis, includes aircraft construction, as well as a complex of industries and technologies working for the aircraft industry. Thus, development and introducing into production of aircraft necessary for the domestic market and the markets of third countries, provide a significant synergistic effect both for the aviation industry itself and for a wide range of subcontractors. Focusing the state attention on the advanced development of the aircraft industry as a locomotive for the growth of a new technological structure retransmits the development impulse to the whole economy, will allow to achieve target goals both of increasing investment in promising areas, and in loading productive capacities, as well as providing employment through creation of new High-tech jobs. If it were not for the sabotage of the middle-level management in the aviation industry, the latter would have long ago become a point of growth. But, as A thoughtful analysis shows, such state of affairs simply does not suit many people.

After four years of depression (2013–2016), our country this year came out of recession and again went into a stage of stagnation. If we take serious measures that need to be worked out and basically adopted this year, then as early as 2018–2019, our country can resume socio-economic growth.

The European Union (EU) and Kazakhstan have established close economic and trade relations much thanks to EU Strategy for Central Asia and Kazakh state program Path to Europe. Bilateral trade have been growing steadily since 2002. Today EU is Kazakhstan’s first trade partner with annual turnover of ,1 billion representing a half of the country total trade in 2016 and the largest investor, ahead of Russia and China. EU imports from Kazakhstan are dominated by energy (minerals, fuels) products. The main EU exports to Kazakhstan include machinery and transport equipment, other manufactured goods and chemicals. In 2015 Kazakhstan has joined WTO with the EU consistently supporting Kazakhstan’s accession. Over the past two decades, Kazakhstan and EU have developed a strong and mutually beneficial energy cooperation. Major EU-based energy companies have significant investments in the Kazakh oil and gas industry. Currently, around 70% of Kazakhstan oil exports go to Europe, corresponding to 6.5% of the EU total oil imports. The 2017-address by the President Nursultan Nazarbayev comprise an industrial strategy aimed at modernizing Kazakhstan’s economy by diversifying it away from overdependence on extractive industries, targeting R&D and joining the top 30 most developed countries by 2050. Therefore Enhanced Partnership and Cooperation Agreement signed in 2015 offers new opportunities for Kazakhstan and EU and could be interesting for partners in the Eurasian Economic Union.

BRICS countries today are the most intensively developing countries of the world economy, since they have a rich resource base, scientific and labor potential. According to leading economists it is economic growth of Brazil, Russia, India, China and the Republic of South Africa that will ensure the future economic growth of the world economy. At the same time, the BRICS countries are the largest agricultural producers, accounting one third of the world agricultural production. About half of the world’s pork volume and about one third of poultry and beef are produced at their territory. At the same time, there are certain trends of specialization of each country in the world agricultural market. All of above enumerates stipulate relevance to study of current state and development prospects of agriculture in the BRICS countries. The methodological basis of the study, results of which are presented in the article, are statistical methods for analyzing the level of development of agriculture and cross-country comparisons. They make it possible to obtain a quantitative assessment of the place of each country in the world market of agricultural product.