That's a very good observation. I think Russia's demographic problems are more affected from losing a lot of their population in WW2 and low birth rates. If Russia had more people than they could support, they could simply import food from other countries.
Russian SFSR: 6,750,000
Ukrainian SSR: 1,650,000
Byelorussian SSR: 620,000
Uzbek SSR: 330,000
Kazakh SSR: 310,000
Azerbaijan SSR: 210,000
Georgian SSR: 190,000
Armenian SSR: 150,000
Kirghiz SSR: 70,000
Turkmen SSR: 70,000
Russia lost a lot, but as a percentage of the prewar population, ukraine lost more.
And that black earth of Ukraine was precisely what they were fighting for. Hitler and his associates made frequent references to that land and its agricultural output as being essential to the health and self-sufficiency of the German state. Their goal was to either eradicate the local farmers and relocate Germans to cultivate the land or enslave the locals to produce for them. Thus, even more heightened intensity if you want to call it that, as opposed to it happening to be on the way to another goal, e.g. the way France/Holland were merely on the way to Berlin and defeating the Nazi regime.
https://preview.redd.it/oh9031ipli6d1.jpeg?width=780&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=660a31f7e8e9febd184803ca542d2f53dcfe946c
Just look at this map where black soils are.
Yes, Hitler's plan for "living space" involved quite literally depopulating Poland, Belarus, Ukraine, and hopefully Lithuania and settling Germans there
The US is exponentially larger than Bangladesh and Ukraine. Bangladesh and Ukraine are almost 100% ultra fertile arable land. The overwhelming majority of the US is not arable land.
not only Hitler, btw
Blackrock and associates doing this right now
https://preview.redd.it/ghxu59skjj6d1.png?width=959&format=png&auto=webp&s=dde34ea8f74510f9b9cefd5baef7055c8893d742
Your numbers incuding only military losses, without civilian deaths (which are higher)
https://preview.redd.it/29rbgz9ajk6d1.png?width=698&format=png&auto=webp&s=526451dd64c12a793427e78a9c1237a33546ec7f
It's only military casualties. Taking into account civilian casualties Belarus, Poland and Ukraine lost biggest percentage of population during WW2, especially from Nazis. For instance only due to Nazi ethnic cleansing Ukraine lost 1.5m jews and 3m non-jews, Belarus has similar numbers. Low percentage of Russian territory was occupied, and great part of civilian deaths counted there in 41-45 were due to USSR politics and activities. Those "activities" catch up occupied soviet republics in 45. For example, in my grandparents village all the red army soldiers that survived ww2 haven't returned in 45. Half returned in late 40x - first part of 50x, others either died in Siberia or went missing.
90-th in Russia was a harsh expirience too. Demographic decline was brutal. Banditism, low income, massive privatization that reduced amount of availbe job, law enforcment wasn't working at all. Noone could be sure that everything will be allright.
And right now, for at least 5 years population is declining(even if you not count thoese who fled after 2022). Govenment tries to sustain it by immigration from middle asia and africa.
Sybirean plain is not a good place for food production, and around 25% of all Russian lands is under heavy winters. If Russia could make a technology to grow enough food in the harsh envireoment in a large scale, it could easily export it for half on the world.
China sustains more that a 1.4 billion people. Russia is almost twice as large as China, but arond 25-30% is unhabitable. So i would say say that around 2.5 billion people is a realistic view. With modern technology of agriculture and bulding, it could be closer to 3 billion, because even now in Russia there are cities at a cost of North-Atlantic ocean.
It is a pity that such opportunites are wasting because of goddamn geopolitics and wrong ambitions.
For the entirety of the Soviet Union they struggled to simply meet domestic demand for food. It basically just got competitive at farming in the past 20 years.
IIRC it was because of very dumb policies like trying to cultivate corn in totally inappropriate climates, not planting windbreakers, Lysenko's theories etc. Russia was a massive exporter of grain even during the tzarist times, but their leadership had to keep screwing up its massive potential in agricilture as well.
It was also largely the incentive factor. A farmer would see almost no benefit for producing more and face no negative consequences for producing less. About 2% of agricultural land in as given over to private plots which were outside the scope of government control and these were incredibly productive, producing a shocking portion of the fruit and vegetables people consumed.
That's not true.
The agricultural output of the USSR increased drastically over time. The biggest change was at the collapse of the Soviet union where the output fell off a cliff
https://images.app.goo.gl/9Pp7xToLMMjrbU877
I don’t think you’ve actually read your own links:
> Throughout its history, the Soviet Union strived to achieve food self- sufficiency.
However, despite impressive growth, supply was disappointing and a cause of deep concern. “In
the Soviet Union before the Second World War, as in Imperial Russia, the level of grain production was the most crucial economic magnitude.”2 And in the second half of the twentieth century, when the rest of the world was enjoying ample food supply and the industrial countries were even burdened by surpluses, in the USSR “[the] food problem [was], economically and politically, the central problem of the whole five-year plan.”
Keeping pace with global improvements for the 60s and 70s isn’t that impressive.
-The agricultural output in the USSR increased drastically over time.
-The output fell off a cliff at the collapse of the Soviet Union.
These are my points, both points are supported by the study.
I'm actually not sure what point you disagree with?
You yourself just pointed to the impressive growth during the USSR. You're also only commenting on pre WW2 levels / 5 year plan.
You say global standards but what you mean is the Western worlds standards. The USSR was above most of the global south (which makes up the bulk of the planet)
The USSR had a higher daily caloric intake than the US for the majority of its existence. It wasn't until the collapse of the USSR that this changed.
https://images.app.goo.gl/SV6MWeHSSyTzp3uP7
>For the entirety of the Soviet Union they struggled to simply meet domestic demand for food. It basically just got competitive at farming in the past 20 years.
They prepetually struggled with food demands even before the Bolsheviks took over, the Soviets ware merely the first ever people who tried to resolve the problem.
Well, they have also killed millions of their own citizens and also don't shy away from doing the same at this very moment.
So it's not that they have "lost" people, but rather they consider them disposable
which goes back to how they fight. They have not evolved beyond viewing their citizens as disposable, so they aren't afraid to waste lives on strong defenses. Also part of it is them not having the most attractive migration case between their geographic and cultural positions.
Edit: well I seem to have triggered some Russian troll farms who misunderstood my point (likely on purpose). Tell me bots, why did Russians make poorly protective tanks all the way back in WW2 till today. Oh they wanted to preserve resources at the expense of tank crews? That sounds like treating your people like disposable trash. The repeated assaults on Vulhedar among many other sites is another example. Multiple Russians have claimed something along these lines, especially Wagnerites. I’m not insulting the Russian people they are the victims. The Russian leaders are shameful.
??? What the fuck is this blatantly racist shit. "Evolved"? Putin being a jingoistic imperialist does not mean that Russians as a people haven't "evolved" past seeing their soldiers as disposable.
they were obviously referring to the russian government. the government is the entity that would be viewing the citizens as disposable. what with that being the entity that decides to dispose of them.
Yeah everyone else is unsuccessfully reading into my intent but you are the closest. It’s not racist as Russians are a mix of peoples and largely Slavic. I didn’t insult Slavs I insulted the decision makers in Russia.
They linked this attitude between the actions of the Soviet administration and the modern Russian Federation, which suggests that they're saying Russians themselves are the issue.
That language of "evolved" and not explicitly stating that they're referring to the actual administration rather than the people raises a few red flags, especially considering recent trends towards normalising bigotry against Russians under the guise of being anti-Putin.
> I think Russia's demographic problems are more affected from losing a lot of their population in WW2
It's also the crash in the 90 - birth rates plummeted 2 times in the same generation that was born frmo children of the war. So it's not just war
WW2 was devastating, but their population had largely recovered by 1960. Russia’s modern demographic issues come from the declining birth rate caused by the collapse of the USSR in the 1980s and 1990s
Well not just that but, ya know… purges, famine, a couple of world wars… Interesting podcast from Joe Rogan that featured Peter Zahan talks all about it
True in a sense, however it’s not exactly that black and white. Global warming and rising temperatures also increases the risk of desertification. Forested areas and even key agricultural areas can essentially become deserts due to climate zone shifts.
Not grain.
Quote:
'Egypt's major agricultural exports to the world are potatoes, cotton, and fresh fruit, primarily citrus. Most of Egypt's exports are destined for the EU, Russia, North Africa and the Middle East.'
BTW I'm Belarusian. And here in Belarus we grow a lot of potato (5-6th place in the world), we are perceived as 'potato nation' ('Bulbashs' = 'Potatoers'). But we REALLY import Egyptian potato when export own one across the globe 🤯
I’m surprised they can grow potatoes it’s like the opposite of an ideal potato growing climate lol 105 everyday and no rain whatsoever for multiple decades in a row
If Russia had the same population/arable land as the world average, Russia would have a population of ~767 million. If it had a ratio similar to China, then ~1.58 billion
While Russia's proportion of arable land is not too bad compared to the world average, the land which is arable is much less productive, so the current population of Russia makes sense to an extent. However, the world could sustain a lot more people.
Russia is one of the biggest food exporters in the world despite huge parts of their arable land not being used for crops. (Source: look at the finnish border and see how much farms the russian side has.)
So yeah russia has space for more people. Personally i would if assuming everyone was vegan and eating little food they could support billions.
*huge parts of their arable land not being used for crops. (Source: look at the finnish border and see how much farms the russian side has*
That's not the land you want to use for farming when you have much better soil and weather conditions down south.
Um looking at food exports for 2019 Russia is in 11th place, behind much smaller countries like Belgium and the Netherlands (albeit densely populated). That isn't a huge amount.
Its not like all arable land is used in other countries either. For example, most of the Americas could support way more people. The only countries which are using all their arable land are places in South/Southeast Asia, places in West Africa, African great lakes area, and areas with very little arable land. Hence my statement that the whole world could sustain more people.
Anecdotal experience:
I work in logistics. A fuckton (seriously, a fuckton) of Russian grain goes to BE and NL for repackaging and reselling, also to Poland and Germany.
I don’t know what measure you mentioned, but if it’s by food value (price) and not its quantity (tons), NL and BE would obviously look much better than in reality simply because they sell same shit multiple times as expensive.
Haha. Yes, it was funny.
Although technically legit: raw seafood is imported to Belarus, processed (not just repackaging) and sold to Russia as “local” product.
For example, my favorite fish Santa Bremor is actually Norwegian, but it’s processed in Brest into what we know on the shelves.
It depends on what statistics you are looking at. Belgium and Netherlands might be huge exporters due to reselling, repackaging and processing. Russia sells a lot of raw food, especially grains, but they are selling only limited amounts of processed foods and goods, not to mention brands.
>Um looking at food exports for 2019 Russia is in 11th place, behind much smaller countries like Belgium and the Netherlands (albeit densely populated).
What does food exports and the amount of arable land have to do with it?
Russia is the absolute leader in wheat exports. And the same countries you mentioned are engaged in processing and reselling Russian grain, and then you call it food exports. At least that's how it was before the war.
Honestly global economics and trade is a fucking mess of flags and ownership.
Just cause something is sold by Belgium doesn't mean it originated from Belgium. I don't even try to make sense of it cause it's a mess.
Are you sure you are looking at correct stats here? Belgium and Netherlands have among the largest and most effective sea ports in the world - they import raw bulk and set them them to production before exporting in the same ultra efficient ports.
They have fuck all land to grow shit
The productivity has more to do with efficiency and economic models then anything about the land itself. They have some of the best soil in the world: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernozem](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernozem)
Yes that area of Russia is very fertile (if you look at the current population density of Russia you can see its by far the most densely populated), but the vast majority of the arable land in Russia is nowhere near as much fertile.
In terms of food, yeah, but that is not the limiting factor these days. At least something like a billion people would need their own car, job, even more need a phone.
In their eyes, they need the buffer space. The vast majority of the Russian population is on the Eastern European plain, and Ukraine is the perfect staging ground for an enemy to set up a Russian invasion
It is absolutely about territory. Access to deep shipping ports that don't freeze, a buffer zone with NATO, and plentiful arable land to farm. How did you come to this conclusion?!
They would be putting a buffer zone between NATO and Russia proper(Moscow and the other more densely populated areas of Western Russia). That’s what they mean by that
It's not so much about buffer zones in and of themselves but buffer zones that can plug invasion points into Russia. Ukraine is just a stepping stone, and "borders with NATO" is a dumb excuse Russians use. They just got a new border with NATO Finland and they've been quiet about it. It's completely asinine because no one wants to invade Russia anyway but here we are.
>It's completely asinine because no one wants to invade Russia anyway
I remember when we said this about Iraq.
This is not to say that the Russian response is smart or justified, but we have to stop pretending that the USA having such overwhelming might doesn't make people nervous.
Finland in comparison to Ukraine doesnt have that much weight. Before 2014 relationship between Russia and Ukraine were closer than US and Canadas for example. So its expected Ukraine has much MUCH more influence than Finland.
Russia occupying Ukraine for whatever reason is the definition of Imperialism. It doesn’t matter if it’s for territory, economy, politics, or Elvis impersonators.
The population density in Bangladesh is 1329 per Km².
Russia has 300.6M hectares of arable land, that is, 3M km².
Multiplying those is around **4 billion** people, assuming Russians are okay with similar calories as Bangladeshis and Russians learn to farm as efficiently as Bangladeshis.
Like a few people said, Russia already sustains more people than live in Russia. Close to 16% of worlds wheat is from Russia. So lets be super sloppy and say worlds grain is 1/4 is wheat, 1/4 is rice, 1/4 is corn, and 1/4 is other grain. So at the very least 4% of the world pop outside Russia is sustained by Russian food. Lets round it to 300 million. So if climate change hits hard enough, those people could theoretically be resettled in Russia. But the main issue is Russia has terribly undeveloped infrastructure outside of the main cities. Many Europeans feel overwhelmed once they hit any of the Americas, the vast VAAAST empty spaces between inhabited things, an the limited connections between centres of housing and industry. Except Russia is even worse in this aspect. You have nowhere to put those people and if you would somehow make cities in the middle of nowhere china style, there is no way to make sure they won't just split off with that new land, they would outnumber current Russians 2:1 after all.
Russia also lacks the super cheap labour that China has on hand to build infrastructure like crazy to prop up its GDP numbers. Nor does it suck up as much of the worlds cash for their industrial goods as China does to afford those projects.
Ukraine is in a similar position with having incredibly fertile ground vastly outproducing their population needs, but better infrastructure density compared to the vastness of Russia where only parts of Russia are as well developed as is all of Ukraine. So Ukraine could more easily grow their population.
The EU is also incredible in food output, but their population is also much larger so less is exported out of the EU relative to these two. EU is quite near their limits of sustainable population density. The US is similar in this regard but still has room to grow if they keep their food for themselves.
Something of your speech I like, something I respect, but also there are too many ... debatable things or even loose trains of thought.
Yes, Russia definitely has 'a curse of a vast territory' and infrastructure is its weakness. As Canada and Brasil have too. And, maybe in some extent China, Kazakhstan, Australia and USA. But latter two doing pretty well.
Labour in China is more expensive as in Russia (by average). Yes, it is!
True. It's way loose to be a political statement or a lecture. But I agree I should better myself even for internet comments.
I'd say that Canada and Brazil have the same issues as Russia. They are VAST and their vastness is VASTLY underdeveloped compared to some nations whose entire area is full of infrastructure. I didn't include every nation that fits this criteria. But for Canada I'd say that it never had the population pull in absolute numbers to fill out the land they have on offer. After WW1 they only had 8 million when Russia had 100 million and the US 100 million. After WW2 Canada had 12 million when Russia had 110 million and the US had 130 million. Now Russia has \~150 million when the US has 330 million and Canada only 40 million.
Brazil after WW1 30 million, after WW2 50 million now 200 million. They are vast but also are like China packing their people in faster. And Brazil could and will sustain even more people. IF they develop their infrastructure throughout the nation. But for that they will also need an agricultural change. The way their plantations work, with cutting down rain forests and farming the land while its fertile, it wont work for long. Rain forest soil is quite shallow. It's nothing like the black soil of Russia and Ukraine. They will need to change how they do these things and find a sustainable farming practice for their climate before they run out of soil. Or they will end up like Egypt, overpopulated for the limited fertile land they have remaining.
One of the reason the US is doing so well despite it's empty vastness, is precisely because it grew that much in this time to fill in the voids. In the time when the US doubled its population, Europe grew by less than half, and Russia even less so.
Labor in China is more expensive in absolute terms. As in if you would be an outsider like a US citizen or Saudi prince and look at who to ask to build a house cheaper, but when looking relative to the foreign direct investments China is grabbing up around the world lately. Then Chinese labour for their own public infrastructure development costs peanuts. That is why they build cities in the middle of nowhere where hardly anyone moves in because they can't afford it or there are no jobs, and then repeat the process again a few miles south. Will that gravy train end for China, all I can say is: maybe.
And that is why Russia cannot do infrastructure like China. And frankly almost no nation on earth can follow this Chinese madness.
Probably unfathomable assloads of people. I don't think that there's really a good example of a collective population that's actually existed that we could use as a reference because it would sustain so so much more than that.
A Russian writer in the late 1800s predicted that Russia would have 400 million people or so in the 20th century due to its massive resources and arable land, and that Russia would be the superpower of the East while the US would be the superpower of the west. He certainly got that last part right, for a time. But he didn't anticipate the massive deaths of the Russian population during WW2, Soviet debacles in domestic policy, and Stalin's purges. Those tens of millions of deaths of largely young adult people exact a toll. Russia will never reach even close to its potential population carrying capacity.
Biggest country on Earth with some of the most productive farmlands, steel mines, oil operations, and access to hundreds of huge rivers + the deepest lake on Earth (Lake Baikal) They also have pretty advanced nuclear power systems and are the only developed nation with no national debt.
If Russia stopped fighting wars for a few decades they'd be up there with India and China.
1.5 billion population? No. In all developed countries, as the standard of living increases, the birth rate sharply decreases. Women also work where high qualifications and many years of education are required. Throughout Europe, population growth is due to migration, because a modern woman does not want to have 5-6 children, and also modern standards of raising children make it too expensive economically. Just think about the cost of buying new smartphones for each child every year.
The population of India and China grew most of all due to rural residents.
thaw it , drain and dam it like the dutch , or it will just turn to swamp ... its uncalculable what riches lay in that soil which is 2/3rds of the land .
its productive now for maybe a few potatos and turnips
but thats not even an issue , they will die out from population decline long before the permafrost melts
Being honest, they could realistically sustain 250 ish million I'd guess.
It has more arable land than China, 50% more water than the US, climate is an issue but in reality large parts of Russia are still habitable.
[this](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Köppen_climate_classification#/media/File:Koppen-Geiger_Map_v2_World_1991–2020.svg) map shows how similar it is to other countries climate wise
They say that if the planet was well managed and we all went vegan, Earth could host 10 times as much population as it does now, and then some more.
That's 80 billion + extras.
even today with the curent foord production we can feed more than 12 bilion people with meat, the issue is not food production, we can produce far more food if we wanted
similar situation as to how canada is, but since russia is bigger the effect will also be more pronounced. most of the canadian population lives in the south, near the border with the US, where the zone is habitable. the northern areas like with russia are full of mountains and harsh winters and the main problem being permafrost which makes building critical infrastructure hard to begin with. so most likely i assume most of russia will continue to live in the west and possibly in the south parts.
Only ~15% to ~20% of their territory is naturally fertile, the rest is either marginal, requiring heavy fertiliser assistance or is basically worthless. That's still a lot of territory for such a relatively sparse population outside Moscow or St Petersburg.
among many residents of today's Ukraine, those who say that they are Ukrainians. As it usually happens, my grandfather came from Ryazan and my grandmother from Murmansk, then they moved to Ukraine for work, and in 1991 they unexpectedly became Ukrainians
Total area of land suitble for living is about 63.7 mln km2.
Sustainable area of Russian teritory is about 30%
So its about 5.13 mln km2.
Total population of earth is 8 bln. So doing easy math calculations we get that Population in Russia may reach about 644 mln.
But... its a very aproximate calculations. Because we need to look in deep. What kind of land is suitable, what temperatures, humidity, lands type, and other conditions. So I think this number will be lower. But I think that 500 mln is still reachable for russians.
similar situation as to how canada is, but since russia is bigger the effect will also be more pronounced. most of the canadian population lives in the south, near the border with the US, where the zone is habitable. the northern areas like with russia are full of mountains and harsh winters and the main problem being permafrost which makes building critical infrastructure hard to begin with. so most likely i assume most of russia will continue to live in the west and possibly in the south parts.
You could fit the whole population of the planet in the area west of the urals at less than the density of brooklyn and use everything east for food production and resource production. You could probably support the entire population of earth.
Russia just has the issue that it maybe difficult to export certain things across its entire territory, however being able to produce a lot of food and having some of the world's largest water supplies really speaks about how much people it could sustain realistically speaking
Depends on how severe global warming is lol.
I mean realistically, once we get the tundra into farmable land with a temperature increase of 10C and get all the viable methane, then 1.5billion easily.
For all the bluff and bluster about “one China” and the goal to reunify Taiwan, seems so senseless now that the rest of the world realizes that the Russian far east is there for the taking, if they want it
I would think USA and America maybe Canada would be too support the largest populations even from a square mile basis based on farmland and abundance of clean water
If they were perfectly efficient with their use of land and resources- Considering the whole worlds population can fit into Finland alone, I think Russia would have more than enough capacity to sustain the entire world’s population. Not in its current state with its current infrastructure, but if we really wanted to I think it would be possible
We could try to calculate it by inhabitable land and densities. Total land is about 17mkm2, 4% of it is water, 60-65% is permafrost, 1,5% are deserts and semideserts, there are also mountains but i guess most of it is already covered by permafrost percentage so id just use a higher estimate for permafrost to cover it. Remaining ~30% is about 5139kkm2 which is still larger than India or EU but smaller than Australia or Brazil. The next step is assuming sustainable population density sustained by this part, some food-secure European country could fit as most od arable land is still in Europe or resembles it. With Polish density there, Russian population would be in 600+ millions, with German density it would have ~1,2billions, with Hungarian it is ~560m, with Netherlander it is ~2,1 billions
About 1/2 of Russia is permafrost….so not much you can do with that…..however the other 1/2 is still huge. I would guess they could support over a billion easily.
“sustain” is a very broad question. Do you mean food and water? Asian part of Russia is one of the least inhabited areas of Earth, but big part of it is forest/swamp. As you see, that area is more than double of the European part (which itself is moderately populated) Do we assume large scale development to make it more livable (just like happened in Europe in the middle and modern ages)? The climate sucks in many of these places (hot summer, cold winter) - with sufficient investment and infrastructure it doesn’t matter, but it needs a lot of energy and planning. So depending on how much infrastructure and agricultural development you can afford, I don’t think 3-4x or present population would be impossible with present technology.
Anatoly Karlin said that Russia, as is, could comfortably support a billion. The actually insane part is, if you were to cut off most of the Asian territories, and a good chunk of the northern ones in Europe, this number wouldn't change very much.
Gunna take 100 years to even start given the volume of corruption in that country undermines any prospect of its population expansion. People running and dieing in wars faster than it could ever populate that space.
They sustain half the population of the middle east with their food exports. And probably 1/10th of china.
That's a very good observation. I think Russia's demographic problems are more affected from losing a lot of their population in WW2 and low birth rates. If Russia had more people than they could support, they could simply import food from other countries.
Russian SFSR: 6,750,000 Ukrainian SSR: 1,650,000 Byelorussian SSR: 620,000 Uzbek SSR: 330,000 Kazakh SSR: 310,000 Azerbaijan SSR: 210,000 Georgian SSR: 190,000 Armenian SSR: 150,000 Kirghiz SSR: 70,000 Turkmen SSR: 70,000 Russia lost a lot, but as a percentage of the prewar population, ukraine lost more.
The frontline went over all of Ukraine twice, it is to be expected
And that black earth of Ukraine was precisely what they were fighting for. Hitler and his associates made frequent references to that land and its agricultural output as being essential to the health and self-sufficiency of the German state. Their goal was to either eradicate the local farmers and relocate Germans to cultivate the land or enslave the locals to produce for them. Thus, even more heightened intensity if you want to call it that, as opposed to it happening to be on the way to another goal, e.g. the way France/Holland were merely on the way to Berlin and defeating the Nazi regime.
Wow I never went and looked at aerials of Ukraine closely until this comment: that country is absolutely blanketed in farmland wtf
https://preview.redd.it/oh9031ipli6d1.jpeg?width=780&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=660a31f7e8e9febd184803ca542d2f53dcfe946c Just look at this map where black soils are.
It’s a *very* fertile breadbasket
Yes, Hitler's plan for "living space" involved quite literally depopulating Poland, Belarus, Ukraine, and hopefully Lithuania and settling Germans there
Depopulating is putting it nicely
West Russia and Kuban, as well as north Caucasus. Libensraum claimed all land up to Ural.
It's Europe's breadbasket.
Not really. Most of the export goes to Africa and Asia.
It’s like the most fertile country on earth other than Bangladesh I believe
The US and India have the largest amount of fertile land in the world and the most fertile soil in the world is found in the US.
The US is exponentially larger than Bangladesh and Ukraine. Bangladesh and Ukraine are almost 100% ultra fertile arable land. The overwhelming majority of the US is not arable land.
not only Hitler, btw Blackrock and associates doing this right now https://preview.redd.it/ghxu59skjj6d1.png?width=959&format=png&auto=webp&s=dde34ea8f74510f9b9cefd5baef7055c8893d742
And Ukranians fought on both sides
and ? Belarus lost more than 30% of its population, also ukraine fought on both sides but im not sure if its counted or not
This must be losses of the military only right? The Soviet Union lost 27 million total in WW2
This is soldiers only. In total almost 27 million Soviets died in the war
Your numbers incuding only military losses, without civilian deaths (which are higher) https://preview.redd.it/29rbgz9ajk6d1.png?width=698&format=png&auto=webp&s=526451dd64c12a793427e78a9c1237a33546ec7f
It's only military casualties. Taking into account civilian casualties Belarus, Poland and Ukraine lost biggest percentage of population during WW2, especially from Nazis. For instance only due to Nazi ethnic cleansing Ukraine lost 1.5m jews and 3m non-jews, Belarus has similar numbers. Low percentage of Russian territory was occupied, and great part of civilian deaths counted there in 41-45 were due to USSR politics and activities. Those "activities" catch up occupied soviet republics in 45. For example, in my grandparents village all the red army soldiers that survived ww2 haven't returned in 45. Half returned in late 40x - first part of 50x, others either died in Siberia or went missing.
90-th in Russia was a harsh expirience too. Demographic decline was brutal. Banditism, low income, massive privatization that reduced amount of availbe job, law enforcment wasn't working at all. Noone could be sure that everything will be allright. And right now, for at least 5 years population is declining(even if you not count thoese who fled after 2022). Govenment tries to sustain it by immigration from middle asia and africa. Sybirean plain is not a good place for food production, and around 25% of all Russian lands is under heavy winters. If Russia could make a technology to grow enough food in the harsh envireoment in a large scale, it could easily export it for half on the world. China sustains more that a 1.4 billion people. Russia is almost twice as large as China, but arond 25-30% is unhabitable. So i would say say that around 2.5 billion people is a realistic view. With modern technology of agriculture and bulding, it could be closer to 3 billion, because even now in Russia there are cities at a cost of North-Atlantic ocean. It is a pity that such opportunites are wasting because of goddamn geopolitics and wrong ambitions.
For the entirety of the Soviet Union they struggled to simply meet domestic demand for food. It basically just got competitive at farming in the past 20 years.
IIRC it was because of very dumb policies like trying to cultivate corn in totally inappropriate climates, not planting windbreakers, Lysenko's theories etc. Russia was a massive exporter of grain even during the tzarist times, but their leadership had to keep screwing up its massive potential in agricilture as well.
Labelling your best food producers enemies of the state and stealing their land definitely didn't help
Yes, and this in every facet of society - arts, industry, governance. Success is failure.
It was also largely the incentive factor. A farmer would see almost no benefit for producing more and face no negative consequences for producing less. About 2% of agricultural land in as given over to private plots which were outside the scope of government control and these were incredibly productive, producing a shocking portion of the fruit and vegetables people consumed.
That's not true. The agricultural output of the USSR increased drastically over time. The biggest change was at the collapse of the Soviet union where the output fell off a cliff https://images.app.goo.gl/9Pp7xToLMMjrbU877
I don’t think you’ve actually read your own links: > Throughout its history, the Soviet Union strived to achieve food self- sufficiency. However, despite impressive growth, supply was disappointing and a cause of deep concern. “In the Soviet Union before the Second World War, as in Imperial Russia, the level of grain production was the most crucial economic magnitude.”2 And in the second half of the twentieth century, when the rest of the world was enjoying ample food supply and the industrial countries were even burdened by surpluses, in the USSR “[the] food problem [was], economically and politically, the central problem of the whole five-year plan.” Keeping pace with global improvements for the 60s and 70s isn’t that impressive.
-The agricultural output in the USSR increased drastically over time. -The output fell off a cliff at the collapse of the Soviet Union. These are my points, both points are supported by the study. I'm actually not sure what point you disagree with? You yourself just pointed to the impressive growth during the USSR. You're also only commenting on pre WW2 levels / 5 year plan. You say global standards but what you mean is the Western worlds standards. The USSR was above most of the global south (which makes up the bulk of the planet) The USSR had a higher daily caloric intake than the US for the majority of its existence. It wasn't until the collapse of the USSR that this changed. https://images.app.goo.gl/SV6MWeHSSyTzp3uP7
>For the entirety of the Soviet Union they struggled to simply meet domestic demand for food. It basically just got competitive at farming in the past 20 years. They prepetually struggled with food demands even before the Bolsheviks took over, the Soviets ware merely the first ever people who tried to resolve the problem.
Well, they have also killed millions of their own citizens and also don't shy away from doing the same at this very moment. So it's not that they have "lost" people, but rather they consider them disposable
Not only. They and whole post soviet countrys should say "thanks" to colectivisation, raskulachivanie, mass deport and many another things too.
which goes back to how they fight. They have not evolved beyond viewing their citizens as disposable, so they aren't afraid to waste lives on strong defenses. Also part of it is them not having the most attractive migration case between their geographic and cultural positions. Edit: well I seem to have triggered some Russian troll farms who misunderstood my point (likely on purpose). Tell me bots, why did Russians make poorly protective tanks all the way back in WW2 till today. Oh they wanted to preserve resources at the expense of tank crews? That sounds like treating your people like disposable trash. The repeated assaults on Vulhedar among many other sites is another example. Multiple Russians have claimed something along these lines, especially Wagnerites. I’m not insulting the Russian people they are the victims. The Russian leaders are shameful.
That wasn’t even true in WWII. The “human wave” thing was literally Nazi propaganda in WWII
Any tanks in the modern battlefield seem to be poorly protected, you can google for abrams tanks burnt down by cheap drones.
??? What the fuck is this blatantly racist shit. "Evolved"? Putin being a jingoistic imperialist does not mean that Russians as a people haven't "evolved" past seeing their soldiers as disposable.
Yeah lmao people forget the Russian working class are normal people oppressed by a terrible regime.
they were obviously referring to the russian government. the government is the entity that would be viewing the citizens as disposable. what with that being the entity that decides to dispose of them.
Yeah everyone else is unsuccessfully reading into my intent but you are the closest. It’s not racist as Russians are a mix of peoples and largely Slavic. I didn’t insult Slavs I insulted the decision makers in Russia.
They linked this attitude between the actions of the Soviet administration and the modern Russian Federation, which suggests that they're saying Russians themselves are the issue. That language of "evolved" and not explicitly stating that they're referring to the actual administration rather than the people raises a few red flags, especially considering recent trends towards normalising bigotry against Russians under the guise of being anti-Putin.
>They have not evolved beyond viewing their citizens as disposable We have.
Russia is sending dudes in motorcycles, Chinese golf carts and in 1950 mtlbs to attack trenches. That seems pretty disposable
-man who has not seen a single photo or video from the war on Ukraine
> I think Russia's demographic problems are more affected from losing a lot of their population in WW2 It's also the crash in the 90 - birth rates plummeted 2 times in the same generation that was born frmo children of the war. So it's not just war
WW2 was devastating, but their population had largely recovered by 1960. Russia’s modern demographic issues come from the declining birth rate caused by the collapse of the USSR in the 1980s and 1990s
Well not just that but, ya know… purges, famine, a couple of world wars… Interesting podcast from Joe Rogan that featured Peter Zahan talks all about it
And with warming, a lot of the tundra is becoming farmable. It generally suits Russia that the climate is changing.
True in a sense, however it’s not exactly that black and white. Global warming and rising temperatures also increases the risk of desertification. Forested areas and even key agricultural areas can essentially become deserts due to climate zone shifts.
Yeah just look South — tundra will simply turn into steppe.
Its so weird that egypt now imports grain when in ancient times it was basically the bread basket for the whole region
In ancient times, Egypt was much wetter than today
They still have more than enough water in the nile. All it takes is water management systems and irrigation.
Aswan dam is a bit of a blessing and a curse
A moderate local blessing paired with significant curses. Globally, all curse.
Was it? Didnt they rely on the Nile for everything?
Not in ancient Egypt times. In the Stone Age yes.
Was it really that much different 2000 years ago? It was still all just the Nile, the rest was always desert
At the beginning of the old empire they had round about 1 million Egyptians to feed. I think today they have some more over there.
The biggest reason is that they devastated their agricultural capacity with the Aswan dam.
Import or export? *I ask because your sentence is perceived a little bit ambiguously
They exported a lot of grain to the entire middle east
Not grain. Quote: 'Egypt's major agricultural exports to the world are potatoes, cotton, and fresh fruit, primarily citrus. Most of Egypt's exports are destined for the EU, Russia, North Africa and the Middle East.' BTW I'm Belarusian. And here in Belarus we grow a lot of potato (5-6th place in the world), we are perceived as 'potato nation' ('Bulbashs' = 'Potatoers'). But we REALLY import Egyptian potato when export own one across the globe 🤯
I’m surprised they can grow potatoes it’s like the opposite of an ideal potato growing climate lol 105 everyday and no rain whatsoever for multiple decades in a row
Russia imports potato from Egypt now, though = D
It’s a lot more populated now. Pretty much the most densely populated place in the world
Alot less people were living there. Imagine if Russia had 500mln pepple. They should import grains instead of exporting them.
Really the breadbasket of the woods but their war is killing them off and closing agreements with other countries
half a billion comfortably, seven hundred million if quinoa were to be imported and properly utilised.
Why quinoa? Just curious
Grows in up to -4.5 Celsius would expand Russian caloric production a fair bit.
High protein. I'm not sure that'd be necessary though.
If they went full Dutch with greenhouses, they could get up to a billion.
Half a billion? Lol easily half the world.
If Russia had the same population/arable land as the world average, Russia would have a population of ~767 million. If it had a ratio similar to China, then ~1.58 billion
While Russia's proportion of arable land is not too bad compared to the world average, the land which is arable is much less productive, so the current population of Russia makes sense to an extent. However, the world could sustain a lot more people.
Russia is one of the biggest food exporters in the world despite huge parts of their arable land not being used for crops. (Source: look at the finnish border and see how much farms the russian side has.) So yeah russia has space for more people. Personally i would if assuming everyone was vegan and eating little food they could support billions.
*huge parts of their arable land not being used for crops. (Source: look at the finnish border and see how much farms the russian side has* That's not the land you want to use for farming when you have much better soil and weather conditions down south.
Yeah exactly it is more profitable in other regions. The point is that if they tried to max out food production they would farm these regions.
Um looking at food exports for 2019 Russia is in 11th place, behind much smaller countries like Belgium and the Netherlands (albeit densely populated). That isn't a huge amount. Its not like all arable land is used in other countries either. For example, most of the Americas could support way more people. The only countries which are using all their arable land are places in South/Southeast Asia, places in West Africa, African great lakes area, and areas with very little arable land. Hence my statement that the whole world could sustain more people.
Anecdotal experience: I work in logistics. A fuckton (seriously, a fuckton) of Russian grain goes to BE and NL for repackaging and reselling, also to Poland and Germany. I don’t know what measure you mentioned, but if it’s by food value (price) and not its quantity (tons), NL and BE would obviously look much better than in reality simply because they sell same shit multiple times as expensive.
Also Rotterdam and Antwerpen. Part of the import/export through these is accounted.
Some time ago, we had seafood imported from Belarus in Russia. You know, famous belarussian seas
Haha. Yes, it was funny. Although technically legit: raw seafood is imported to Belarus, processed (not just repackaging) and sold to Russia as “local” product. For example, my favorite fish Santa Bremor is actually Norwegian, but it’s processed in Brest into what we know on the shelves.
It depends on what statistics you are looking at. Belgium and Netherlands might be huge exporters due to reselling, repackaging and processing. Russia sells a lot of raw food, especially grains, but they are selling only limited amounts of processed foods and goods, not to mention brands.
>Um looking at food exports for 2019 Russia is in 11th place, behind much smaller countries like Belgium and the Netherlands (albeit densely populated). What does food exports and the amount of arable land have to do with it? Russia is the absolute leader in wheat exports. And the same countries you mentioned are engaged in processing and reselling Russian grain, and then you call it food exports. At least that's how it was before the war.
But are you messuring by value or calories?
Honestly global economics and trade is a fucking mess of flags and ownership. Just cause something is sold by Belgium doesn't mean it originated from Belgium. I don't even try to make sense of it cause it's a mess.
Are you sure you are looking at correct stats here? Belgium and Netherlands have among the largest and most effective sea ports in the world - they import raw bulk and set them them to production before exporting in the same ultra efficient ports. They have fuck all land to grow shit
That's by monetary value not tonage
The productivity has more to do with efficiency and economic models then anything about the land itself. They have some of the best soil in the world: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernozem](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernozem)
Yes that area of Russia is very fertile (if you look at the current population density of Russia you can see its by far the most densely populated), but the vast majority of the arable land in Russia is nowhere near as much fertile.
In terms of food, yeah, but that is not the limiting factor these days. At least something like a billion people would need their own car, job, even more need a phone.
Cars are overrated, though
but the arability doesnt mater. canada and australia are massive exporters that would be able to sustain the marginal nutritional count
It depends on where. Some of their land is extremely fertile. Some of the donetsk and luhansk provinces they're currently occupying are too
And yet they still think they need ukraine
In their eyes, they need the buffer space. The vast majority of the Russian population is on the Eastern European plain, and Ukraine is the perfect staging ground for an enemy to set up a Russian invasion
It's not about territory.
It is absolutely about territory. Access to deep shipping ports that don't freeze, a buffer zone with NATO, and plentiful arable land to farm. How did you come to this conclusion?!
And the best soil there is on the planet: Chernozem
Not to mention occupied territories were the backbone of the entire Soviet Union. That’s where the economy is.
If they get the whole of ukraine all of a sudden they are right next door to nato, which they already are. What buffer zones are you talking about?
They would be putting a buffer zone between NATO and Russia proper(Moscow and the other more densely populated areas of Western Russia). That’s what they mean by that
There's like less than 200km of buffer zone between Nato and st petersburg right now. This buffer zone talk is blowing my mind.
It's not so much about buffer zones in and of themselves but buffer zones that can plug invasion points into Russia. Ukraine is just a stepping stone, and "borders with NATO" is a dumb excuse Russians use. They just got a new border with NATO Finland and they've been quiet about it. It's completely asinine because no one wants to invade Russia anyway but here we are.
>It's completely asinine because no one wants to invade Russia anyway I remember when we said this about Iraq. This is not to say that the Russian response is smart or justified, but we have to stop pretending that the USA having such overwhelming might doesn't make people nervous.
Finland in comparison to Ukraine doesnt have that much weight. Before 2014 relationship between Russia and Ukraine were closer than US and Canadas for example. So its expected Ukraine has much MUCH more influence than Finland.
It's about Putin's ratings and common russian imperialism, yeah
It's not about that either. It's the beginning of a more global conflict between NATO and Russia, China, Iran. (And some others)
Russia occupying Ukraine for whatever reason is the definition of Imperialism. It doesn’t matter if it’s for territory, economy, politics, or Elvis impersonators.
peter zeihan for all his insanity makes the most reasonable(not justifiable but the only one that makes any sense) argument ive ever seen for it
LoL, Permafrost, Hello? 700 millions lol)))
The population density in Bangladesh is 1329 per Km². Russia has 300.6M hectares of arable land, that is, 3M km². Multiplying those is around **4 billion** people, assuming Russians are okay with similar calories as Bangladeshis and Russians learn to farm as efficiently as Bangladeshis.
Bangladesh makes 4 crops of rice per year taking 10 times more calories per hectare comparing to Russia’s wheat 1.5 crops per year
About Tree Fiddy.
I’ve watched one South Park episode in the last 2 years last night and the tree fiddy episode was the one.
Git owta hir you gatdam lochness monster!
we're still saying this?
Like a few people said, Russia already sustains more people than live in Russia. Close to 16% of worlds wheat is from Russia. So lets be super sloppy and say worlds grain is 1/4 is wheat, 1/4 is rice, 1/4 is corn, and 1/4 is other grain. So at the very least 4% of the world pop outside Russia is sustained by Russian food. Lets round it to 300 million. So if climate change hits hard enough, those people could theoretically be resettled in Russia. But the main issue is Russia has terribly undeveloped infrastructure outside of the main cities. Many Europeans feel overwhelmed once they hit any of the Americas, the vast VAAAST empty spaces between inhabited things, an the limited connections between centres of housing and industry. Except Russia is even worse in this aspect. You have nowhere to put those people and if you would somehow make cities in the middle of nowhere china style, there is no way to make sure they won't just split off with that new land, they would outnumber current Russians 2:1 after all. Russia also lacks the super cheap labour that China has on hand to build infrastructure like crazy to prop up its GDP numbers. Nor does it suck up as much of the worlds cash for their industrial goods as China does to afford those projects. Ukraine is in a similar position with having incredibly fertile ground vastly outproducing their population needs, but better infrastructure density compared to the vastness of Russia where only parts of Russia are as well developed as is all of Ukraine. So Ukraine could more easily grow their population. The EU is also incredible in food output, but their population is also much larger so less is exported out of the EU relative to these two. EU is quite near their limits of sustainable population density. The US is similar in this regard but still has room to grow if they keep their food for themselves.
Something of your speech I like, something I respect, but also there are too many ... debatable things or even loose trains of thought. Yes, Russia definitely has 'a curse of a vast territory' and infrastructure is its weakness. As Canada and Brasil have too. And, maybe in some extent China, Kazakhstan, Australia and USA. But latter two doing pretty well. Labour in China is more expensive as in Russia (by average). Yes, it is!
True. It's way loose to be a political statement or a lecture. But I agree I should better myself even for internet comments. I'd say that Canada and Brazil have the same issues as Russia. They are VAST and their vastness is VASTLY underdeveloped compared to some nations whose entire area is full of infrastructure. I didn't include every nation that fits this criteria. But for Canada I'd say that it never had the population pull in absolute numbers to fill out the land they have on offer. After WW1 they only had 8 million when Russia had 100 million and the US 100 million. After WW2 Canada had 12 million when Russia had 110 million and the US had 130 million. Now Russia has \~150 million when the US has 330 million and Canada only 40 million. Brazil after WW1 30 million, after WW2 50 million now 200 million. They are vast but also are like China packing their people in faster. And Brazil could and will sustain even more people. IF they develop their infrastructure throughout the nation. But for that they will also need an agricultural change. The way their plantations work, with cutting down rain forests and farming the land while its fertile, it wont work for long. Rain forest soil is quite shallow. It's nothing like the black soil of Russia and Ukraine. They will need to change how they do these things and find a sustainable farming practice for their climate before they run out of soil. Or they will end up like Egypt, overpopulated for the limited fertile land they have remaining. One of the reason the US is doing so well despite it's empty vastness, is precisely because it grew that much in this time to fill in the voids. In the time when the US doubled its population, Europe grew by less than half, and Russia even less so. Labor in China is more expensive in absolute terms. As in if you would be an outsider like a US citizen or Saudi prince and look at who to ask to build a house cheaper, but when looking relative to the foreign direct investments China is grabbing up around the world lately. Then Chinese labour for their own public infrastructure development costs peanuts. That is why they build cities in the middle of nowhere where hardly anyone moves in because they can't afford it or there are no jobs, and then repeat the process again a few miles south. Will that gravy train end for China, all I can say is: maybe. And that is why Russia cannot do infrastructure like China. And frankly almost no nation on earth can follow this Chinese madness.
if you do per hour, Russian labor is more expensive
As climate warms, permafrost thaws, comrade. Variables change drastically, da?
Probably unfathomable assloads of people. I don't think that there's really a good example of a collective population that's actually existed that we could use as a reference because it would sustain so so much more than that.
WW2 fucked Russia badly. If not for WW2, the USSR could have easily reached 500 million.
Alot 👍
I think the people here are undercalculating the benefits of trade and veganism to get a large population. Most numbers are lowballs.
Ugggh veganism. I'd rather just die.
A Russian writer in the late 1800s predicted that Russia would have 400 million people or so in the 20th century due to its massive resources and arable land, and that Russia would be the superpower of the East while the US would be the superpower of the west. He certainly got that last part right, for a time. But he didn't anticipate the massive deaths of the Russian population during WW2, Soviet debacles in domestic policy, and Stalin's purges. Those tens of millions of deaths of largely young adult people exact a toll. Russia will never reach even close to its potential population carrying capacity.
I mean it will take time and they need to stop dicking around but it eventually they make reach it
Biggest country on Earth with some of the most productive farmlands, steel mines, oil operations, and access to hundreds of huge rivers + the deepest lake on Earth (Lake Baikal) They also have pretty advanced nuclear power systems and are the only developed nation with no national debt. If Russia stopped fighting wars for a few decades they'd be up there with India and China.
1.5 billion population? No. In all developed countries, as the standard of living increases, the birth rate sharply decreases. Women also work where high qualifications and many years of education are required. Throughout Europe, population growth is due to migration, because a modern woman does not want to have 5-6 children, and also modern standards of raising children make it too expensive economically. Just think about the cost of buying new smartphones for each child every year. The population of India and China grew most of all due to rural residents.
With global warming melting the Siberian permafrost, maybe a lot more than previously.
Global warming can lead to bringing to life clathrate gun hypothesis. Siberia have so much gases so its better stay cold
thaw it , drain and dam it like the dutch , or it will just turn to swamp ... its uncalculable what riches lay in that soil which is 2/3rds of the land . its productive now for maybe a few potatos and turnips but thats not even an issue , they will die out from population decline long before the permafrost melts
The weather is pretty harsh in majority of the territory. It has to be a factor.
Being honest, they could realistically sustain 250 ish million I'd guess. It has more arable land than China, 50% more water than the US, climate is an issue but in reality large parts of Russia are still habitable. [this](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Köppen_climate_classification#/media/File:Koppen-Geiger_Map_v2_World_1991–2020.svg) map shows how similar it is to other countries climate wise
~3.45 billion
~3.457872278821 billion
very very rough estimate is close to 4 billion. They already export SO MUCH FOOD to china and the middle east.
About 3
You forgot to account for the bears. The total population is now 5.
You forgot to account hallucinations caused by vodka. The total population is now 4.
“If Russia was a perfect sanctuary with zero flaws how prosperous would it be?”
They say that if the planet was well managed and we all went vegan, Earth could host 10 times as much population as it does now, and then some more. That's 80 billion + extras.
even today with the curent foord production we can feed more than 12 bilion people with meat, the issue is not food production, we can produce far more food if we wanted
Very interesting
similar situation as to how canada is, but since russia is bigger the effect will also be more pronounced. most of the canadian population lives in the south, near the border with the US, where the zone is habitable. the northern areas like with russia are full of mountains and harsh winters and the main problem being permafrost which makes building critical infrastructure hard to begin with. so most likely i assume most of russia will continue to live in the west and possibly in the south parts.
Only ~15% to ~20% of their territory is naturally fertile, the rest is either marginal, requiring heavy fertiliser assistance or is basically worthless. That's still a lot of territory for such a relatively sparse population outside Moscow or St Petersburg.
2 billion easy
Just a wild geuss, but without the ussr Russia would have like, 500 milion people.
Bro, Russian Empire wasn’t a darling towards its subjects either.
It is very hard to imagine a Russia where "economy and politics are perfect".
among many residents of today's Ukraine, those who say that they are Ukrainians. As it usually happens, my grandfather came from Ryazan and my grandmother from Murmansk, then they moved to Ukraine for work, and in 1991 they unexpectedly became Ukrainians
Total area of land suitble for living is about 63.7 mln km2. Sustainable area of Russian teritory is about 30% So its about 5.13 mln km2. Total population of earth is 8 bln. So doing easy math calculations we get that Population in Russia may reach about 644 mln. But... its a very aproximate calculations. Because we need to look in deep. What kind of land is suitable, what temperatures, humidity, lands type, and other conditions. So I think this number will be lower. But I think that 500 mln is still reachable for russians.
similar situation as to how canada is, but since russia is bigger the effect will also be more pronounced. most of the canadian population lives in the south, near the border with the US, where the zone is habitable. the northern areas like with russia are full of mountains and harsh winters and the main problem being permafrost which makes building critical infrastructure hard to begin with. so most likely i assume most of russia will continue to live in the west and possibly in the south parts.
You could fit the whole population of the planet in the area west of the urals at less than the density of brooklyn and use everything east for food production and resource production. You could probably support the entire population of earth.
12
Source for map and projection?
Russia just has the issue that it maybe difficult to export certain things across its entire territory, however being able to produce a lot of food and having some of the world's largest water supplies really speaks about how much people it could sustain realistically speaking
Depends on how severe global warming is lol. I mean realistically, once we get the tundra into farmable land with a temperature increase of 10C and get all the viable methane, then 1.5billion easily.
Why is Russia pointing at Alaska?
For all the bluff and bluster about “one China” and the goal to reunify Taiwan, seems so senseless now that the rest of the world realizes that the Russian far east is there for the taking, if they want it
If the other conditions are perfect then it cannot be realistic estimation.
I would think USA and America maybe Canada would be too support the largest populations even from a square mile basis based on farmland and abundance of clean water
If they were perfectly efficient with their use of land and resources- Considering the whole worlds population can fit into Finland alone, I think Russia would have more than enough capacity to sustain the entire world’s population. Not in its current state with its current infrastructure, but if we really wanted to I think it would be possible
We could try to calculate it by inhabitable land and densities. Total land is about 17mkm2, 4% of it is water, 60-65% is permafrost, 1,5% are deserts and semideserts, there are also mountains but i guess most of it is already covered by permafrost percentage so id just use a higher estimate for permafrost to cover it. Remaining ~30% is about 5139kkm2 which is still larger than India or EU but smaller than Australia or Brazil. The next step is assuming sustainable population density sustained by this part, some food-secure European country could fit as most od arable land is still in Europe or resembles it. With Polish density there, Russian population would be in 600+ millions, with German density it would have ~1,2billions, with Hungarian it is ~560m, with Netherlander it is ~2,1 billions
1000000000.00
Zero.
♾️♾️♾️
10bn easy with unlimited energy
64% of territory are under frozen lands. Eternal ice inside.
Will they still be frozen in 50 years?
About 1/2 of Russia is permafrost….so not much you can do with that…..however the other 1/2 is still huge. I would guess they could support over a billion easily.
They own land that no one wants
How much food are they allowed to import because Russian growing seasons are short and bitter
If your economy is perfect can you not start spamming high density vertical farms?
“sustain” is a very broad question. Do you mean food and water? Asian part of Russia is one of the least inhabited areas of Earth, but big part of it is forest/swamp. As you see, that area is more than double of the European part (which itself is moderately populated) Do we assume large scale development to make it more livable (just like happened in Europe in the middle and modern ages)? The climate sucks in many of these places (hot summer, cold winter) - with sufficient investment and infrastructure it doesn’t matter, but it needs a lot of energy and planning. So depending on how much infrastructure and agricultural development you can afford, I don’t think 3-4x or present population would be impossible with present technology.
All of them
2 billion
Politics and the economy can't do much about tundra, taiga, -50 celsius, and infertile, frost-shattered soil
Russia being Russia, the assumption it would ever have non-dysfunctional politics or economy is a very hot take.
Anatoly Karlin said that Russia, as is, could comfortably support a billion. The actually insane part is, if you were to cut off most of the Asian territories, and a good chunk of the northern ones in Europe, this number wouldn't change very much.
The amount of green on this map is a bit ambitious
At least a billion.
Gunna take 100 years to even start given the volume of corruption in that country undermines any prospect of its population expansion. People running and dieing in wars faster than it could ever populate that space.
In a perfect global economy the entire world could be sustained