RUSSIA'S NATIONAL INTERESTS 33 to Europe. There are certain reserves for expanding export deliveries of the Russian gas. Yet even here one can hardly speak of a marked growth. The Russian metal exporters are also faced with intense competition. The restrictions imposed in the USA on metals supplies from Russia, are having quite a negative impact on the position of the Russian metallurgy. All this signifies that further expansion of the Russian exports requires radical steps for improvement of the competitiveness of the domestic manufacturing industries, above all machine building products and stimulation of their export. Despite some rise in the export of machine-building production in 1998 (its share in the total export accounted for 11.0 percent as compared to 10.1 percent in 1997), this is an unacceptably low ratio for an industrially developed country. Obviously, it is impossible to consolidate the position of the Russian manufacturers on the world markets without governmental support. Nonetheless, the implementation of the federal programme for the export development, adopted by the government in 1996, which envisaged a number of concrete measures to support the exporters, was suspended until November 1998 for want of budgetary funds. It is common knowledge that, in industrially developed countries, the state actively assists its companies in conquering external markets. The state aid to exporters normally consists in R&D financing, tax privileges, export crediting and insuring private export credits, assisting companies participating in exhibitions, fairs, advertising campaigns, and, certainly, in pursuing due policies aimed at creating favourable conditions for companies entering the markets of individual countries and regions. A variety of the state support measures for domestic exporters have spread worldwide, but practically none have so far been applied in Russia. It would be wrong, now that Russia is integrated into the world economy and is in transition to an open economy, to reduce the solution of external economic problems to mere external economic policy measures, all the more so that the economy is now extremely dependent on the external market, thus export growth becomes one of the most important factors of economic growth at large. It is impossible to develop all industries at once, even in the case of major countries. For Russia, whose internal market has markedly shrinked since the Soviet time, it is all the more important to concentrate on the industries which would meet the main internal requirements (taking into account the economic security factor) and become