Sustainable development of the regions, increasing their economic and social potential are largely predetermined by the state of investment and innovation activities in the regions. At the same time, innovation activities are understood as activities aimed at the practical implementation of the results of research and development that increase the efficiency of methods and means of implementing managerial, production, commercial, social, etc. processes in the region, including those related to the creation and implementation of innovations. Innovation involves the implementation and implementation of the results of research and development (R&D) and research and development (R&D) aimed at creating or improving a product, a technological or managerial process, a method of organizing production or selling products. In the most general sense, innovation is the result or process of practical implementation of an innovation in the field of technology, technology, method of organization and management of production or the social sphere, a method of promoting products to the market and its sale.
According to the causes of occurrence, the following types of innovations are distinguished:
reactive, which is a reaction to radical innovative transformations carried out by competitors; strategic, proactive and aimed at obtaining significant competitive advantages in the form of the so-called scientific and technical (innovative) rent.
By the nature of application, innovations are:
product, aimed at the production and use of new products and services; process, aimed at new technologies and methods of production organization; market, related to the entry of the enterprise into new markets or the development of new forms of work in the markets; social, due to the emergence and functioning of new social structures.
In the context of increased competition, innovations turn into a decisive factor in the sustainable development of regions and the country as a whole, since they ensure adaptability, adaptability of territories to rapidly changing market conditions and the external environment. Innovation policy consists in anticipating changes in the resource potential of the region and developing solutions that ensure sustainable regional development by stimulating the reproduction, renewal and modernization of productive forces.
The implementation of regional innovation policy is inevitably associated with investment, i.e. the implementation of investments. In terms of economic content, regional investments are part of the resources of the region, which are deliberately withdrawn from consumption and invested in the expansion or modernization of production (new technologies, equipment, methods of organizing economic activity, etc.) in the hope of making a profit in the future.
Thus, in the most general sense, regional investment policy is a set of actions of economic agents to ensure conditions for simple and expanded reproduction of capital resources in the region. The essence of the investment policy is to ensure the reproduction of fixed assets of production and non-production sectors, their expansion and modernization. The nature of the investment policy is determined by the force of state intervention in economic processes, the degree of coordination of this policy with other state institutions, which include tax, financial and credit, depreciation, licensing and pricing policy, income and employment policy, attraction of foreign investment, as well as the legal field and the general administrative structure. If the investment policy is innovative in nature, then we are talking about investment and innovation policy.
According to the presence and nature of the legal framework, it is possible to distinguish formalized and informal state investment policy. At the same time, a formalized investment policy means the presence of an integral legal framework that regulates the main parameters of the investment process, such as taxes, prices, incomes, tariff system, terms and methods of depreciation of equipment, methods of accounting for fixed assets, etc. As a rule, it is characterized by a high degree of state participation in the economy. Informal investment policy is characterized by a relatively low share of public investment (up to 30%), a large amount of private capital (up to 80% of all economic entities and industrial production volumes) and a relatively unsystematized legal framework in the field of the investment process.
According to the type of management, a distinction is made between liberal and centralized investment policy. The liberal type of investment policy is characterized mainly by economic methods of state regulation of investment processes, a developed vertical system of investors (state – financial institutions – businessmen – small investors), as well as various sources of investment (private, public, attracted, etc.) and developed financial infrastructure. The role of the state is to establish the “rules of the game” in the relationship “investor – object of investment”, which allows the economic system to self-regulate and develop relatively freely. It should be pointed out that the liberal type of investment policy is a hypothetical idealized model for the implementation of the investment process, which in practice cannot exist in principle.
Modern states (including those with developed market economies) are increasingly and willing to resort to the implementation of a centralized investment policy, the main feature of which is the use of direct (including administrative) management methods. Sources of investment in this case are formed through the accumulation of resources by various state structures, long-term forecasting is carried out centrally, and the general legal field strictly regulates the development of the investment process.
In practice, we can talk about a mixed investment policy, combining elements of a liberal and centralized form of investment activity. At the same time, statistics show that at present, even in countries with liberal market economies, the emphasis is shifting quite quickly and confidently towards centralized planning and centralized investment policy (see paragraph 2.1), which seriously calls into question the liberal-market status they proclaim.
The objectives of the current investment policy for the regions at present are: structural adjustment of the regional economy; achieving economic independence and ensuring the economic security of the region; rationalization of the distribution of productive forces in the region and strengthening of its own industrial base (primarily export-oriented industries, production of energy resources, food products); allocation of priority investment projects, based on the interests of the regional economic complex.
The principles of formation of a reasonable regional investment policy are:
efficiency, since investments directed to the economy of the region should bring sufficient profit in conditions limited by the goals of each specific project and the period of its implementation, as well as the resources attracted for it; achieving structural balance, which ensures the balanced development of regions and industries in them; focus due to limited investment resources and the ability to implement a finite number of projects; national significance, which implies the implementation in the process of investment of a particular national ideology and national interests, which is possible only in the conditions of the formation of such an approach on the part of the state authorities of the country and the region.