Fixed Capital and Investment Trends in the Russian Economy in Transition

The article analyzes trends in fixed assets formation and fixed investment in Russia's transition economy. It is shown that the official Rosstat approach to measuring fixed assets and fixed investment may substantially understate fixed assets renovation and replacement rates. The depth of the decline in investment spending during the transition period might therefore be substantially overstated. This bias may be explained by severe difficulties in measuring price and capital replacement trends in first years of transition. Alternative estimates of physical volume indexes of fixed assets and investment in fixed capital by fifteen main industrial sectors and branches during 1991-2003 are derived and industry-specific investment and fixed assets trends are discussed. These alternative fixed asset and investment estimates suggest that conventional views on investment and capital stock trends in the Russian economy need to be revised.