Natural resources as part of national wealth

• Main Authors: Oksana Aleksandrovna LOGVINENKO, Vladimir Evgen’yevich STROVSKIY
• Format: Article
• Language: deu
• Published: Ural State Mining University 2019-06-01
• Series: Izvestiâ Uralʹskogo Gosudarstvennogo Gornogo Universiteta
• Subjects: national wealth; valuation; land; natural resources; natural capital; evolutionary changes
• Online Access: http://www.iuggu.ru/en/2-19-17
• ISSN: 2307-2091; 2500-2414

Relevance. At all times national wealth played the role of the most important indicator of the economic situation of a state. From this point of view, the completeness and accuracy of the assessment of its magnitude continues to be an actual research task to this day. Purpose of research. Identifying evolutionary changes in the mapping of national wealth from the perspective of its natural resources. Research results. The absence of a unified approach to the concept of national wealth in the world community has been proved. The content of methods for assessing national wealth has been disclosed since the late 1960s, when the UN approved the methodology recommended for many countries around the world. Some evolutionary changes in the methods of assessing national wealth were reflected. Particular attention is paid to the accounting of natural resources. In the agrarian economy, land (arable land, forest) acted as an element of national wealth, while its value was expressed in the form of the value of agricultural land. In the industrial economy, arable land, forest, and mineral resources as sources of raw materials were subject to monetary recording. And finally, in the post-industrial economy, the task of recording of natural capital as part of the national wealth is taking account; it is considered as a combination of natural resources and ecosystem services. Becoming economic assets and bringing certain benefits, natural resources and ecosystem services (ecological resources), transforming into the concept of natural capital, have a significant impact on the amount of a country’s national wealth. The lack of sufficient experience, the complexity of the economic assessment of natural capital does not allow for an objective valuation of national wealth. Conclusion. The valuation of natural capital in the composition of national wealth should be one of the priorities of Russian statistics. The concept of total economic value should be considered the most promising for assessing natural capital; it allows to take into account not only the cost of using resources but also the cost of existence, which is extremely important in the framework of the concept of sustainable development of the economy, in order to preserve natural wealth for future generations.