Abstract:

The article outlines the main stages of Russia’s agricultural development in the wake of state reforms since the beginning of the 90s until the present time. It studies the agrarian reform of the 90s, which formed private ownership and created interest in getting profit from economic operations. At the same time poor legislation, severing of economic ties, the lack of due support of farmers undermined large-scale agrarian companies, reduced agrarian lands and led to a significant dependence of the country on food imports. The article focuses on a priority national project of agriculture development fulfilled in 2006-2007, its contribution to the recovery of agriculture, and stresses insufficient elaboration of support measures for companies of various sizes, the weakness of financial support channels.  Special attention was paid to a state agriculture support progamme of 2013-2020.The article assesses the effectiveness of the state measures with the help of financial indicators of agricultural companies. Our critical approach demonstrates that further modernization of Russia’s farming is only possible, if there is long-term financial stability in the segment. At the same time the technologies producing high-quality local seeds and modern equipment should become the priority directions for investment. A state import substitution programme had a significant positive effect on the investment attractiveness of agriculture.