Formation of crop belts for national innovative clusters

The aim of the paper is to study the foreign practice in the formation of innovative agro-industrial clusters and to substantiate scientifically the formation of the Russian soybean agricultural belt with the infrastructure providing selection and production of non-GMO soybean in the required volume for domestic consumption and exports. Comparative and system analysis, situational approach, and field experiments were used for the research. As a result of the study, the US experience in the formation of soybean growing clusters was studied. It was found that soybeans are the predominant crop cultivated on irrigated lands in the states of Mississippi, Arkansas, and Nebraska, where the share of soybeans on irrigated lands reaches 59%. The soybean exports are essential to the economies of the United States, Argentina, and Brazil. The main soybeans are exported to China, the consumption of which is estimated at about 100 million tons of soybeans, and it is worth almost $40 billion. For Russia, the proximity to the world leader in imports of soybeans, China, could be one of the advantages in the expansion of supplies to this country, what would stimulate the development of soybean production and the formation of national innovative clusters. The soybean production is based on high-yielding cultivars adapted to local growing conditions. The selection of cultivars without the use of GMO technologies gives the opportunity of having competitive advantages in the organic market. The newest cultivars of the Russian selection are “VNIIOZ 86” and “Volgogradka 1”, which make it possible to obtain 3-4 tons per hectare on chestnut soils of Volgograd region. The formation of a soybean belt will provide a synergistic effect in soybean selection, organization of soybean production, and independence from foreign seed markets. Under the government support within a specialized cluster the core of which should be research institutes providing the scientific and selection core of the soybean agricultural belt in the South of Russia, the production of soybeans can be organized in volumes that cover the needs of the domestic market and increasing supplies to the world food market.