Development of dairy farming in Ensuring food security of the Irkutsk region

¹ V.B. Sochava Institute of Geography, Siberian branch, Russian Academy of Sciences, Ulan-Batorskaya, Avenue 1, 664033 Irkutsk, Russia
² Irkutsk State University, Karl Marks Avenue 1, 664003 Irkutsk, Russia

^* Corresponding author: rogovskayan@inbox.ru

Abstract

Russian food security consists of the specifics of the development of its regional components. The “food security” concept includes the economic and physical availability of food and its guaranteed quality. Providing the population with high-quality, economically affordable, and sufficient food products is one of the priorities of the Russian state policy in national security matters. The research relevance of the dairy industry in the Irkutsk region is determined by its position as the leading branch of the food industry that forms the food security of the region. Among the processing branches of the agro-industrial complex, the dairy industry is second only to the bakery industry in terms of production volumes. The novelty of the work consists in the fact that (1) it is the first time that the districts of the Irkutsk region are grouped, according to the degree of development of dairy farming; (2) the analysis of the features of the development of the dairy industry of the Irkutsk region, in the context of food security of the region, is carried out; (3) the features of the functioning and territorial differentiation of the dairy herd and milk production are identified; (4) the trends of the dynamics of the dairy herd are considered. As a result, conclusions were drawn about the deep territorial differentiation of the dairy industry under the influence of existing natural, historical, and socio-economic factors.