ROSTOV-ON-DON, March 25. /TASS/. Russia needs to reset its economic policies, including non-resource exports, in accordance with the new world realities, in particular, abandoning the World Trade Organization (WTO) model will help Russian producers compete more successfully on the global market, Konstantin Babkin, co-owner of Rostselmash, the largest agricultural machinery manufacturer in Russia, told TASS.

Earlier, the co-owner of Rostselmash told TASS that over the past two years, the company has seen a decrease in requests for equipment and its production. In 2025, this decrease is projected at 40% compared to 2023.

"Russia formed its modern economic policy in the 1990s, when we sought to join Western structures, joined the WTO, and adjusted our financial sector to the rules of Western companies. All this led to the fact that we became a supplier of raw materials to the foreign market. This, in turn, led to the fact that our machine-building enterprises, both Rosselmash, AvtoVAZ, and Kamaz, are in conditions of unequal competition compared to their foreign colleagues," Babkin said.

"Therefore, we need to restructure our economic policy, bring it into line with the new realities, with the requirements of the new era, so that Russia becomes not the most unprofitable place for production, but, on the contrary, profitable for the production of cars, in particular, and other non-raw materials," he concluded.

According to him, joining the Western economy has long been out of the question. However, under sanctions, Russia continues to adhere to WTO norms.

"We have higher taxes for industrial enterprises, we have much more expensive loans than in other countries, metal is more expensive on the domestic market, electricity is more expensive on the domestic market than abroad," Babkin added.

The Rostselmash harvester-manufacturing plant was founded in 1929 in Rostov-on-Don. Currently, the group includes 13 enterprises producing agricultural machinery. The company's product line consists of more than 150 models and modifications of 24 types of machines and units, including grain and forage harvesters, tractors, sprayers, forage harvesting and grain processing equipment.