According to the results of 2024, Russia has retained its fourth position in the World Bank's rating of world economies, increasing its gap from the nearest pursuers. According to experts, this was possible due to more dynamic growth of gross domestic product (GDP) compared to Japan and Germany.
According to the World Bank, the volume of the Russian economy, calculated at purchasing power parity (PPP), reached $6.92 trillion in 2024, compared to $6.45 trillion in 2023. At the same time, Japan's GDP increased from $6.25 trillion to $6.4 trillion. According to RIA Novosti estimates, the difference between the economies of Russia and Japan doubled to $514 billion against $264 billion a year earlier.
The leading position with a large gap is occupied by China with GDP at PPP of 38.2 trillion dollars. It is followed by the US ($29.2 trillion) and India ($16.2 trillion). After Russia and Japan, the top five include Germany ($6 trillion), followed by Brazil, Indonesia, France and the UK.
Sergey Drobyshevsky, chief researcher at the Gaidar Institute, notes that the key factor that allowed Russia to retain the fourth place in the world ranking in terms of GDP in PPP terms is more intensive economic growth in 2024 compared to Japan and Germany.
In real terms, Russia's GDP grew by 4.3% in 2024, while Japan's grew by 0.1% and Germany's contracted by 0.2%. Given the forecast of further growth of Russia's GDP in 2025-2030, although not at such a rapid pace, but by 2% per year, we can expect further increase in the gap between Russia and Japan and Germany, the expert explained.
Vladimir Yeremkin, Senior Researcher at the Structural Research Laboratory of the IPEI of the Presidential Academy (RANEPA), points to a number of reasons for the higher growth rates of the Russian economy compared to the Japanese economy.
According to the economist, on the one hand, Russia is pursuing an active stimulative budget policy, which is expressed in an increase in government spending and is accompanied by growth in real disposable income of the population. In addition, the successful reorientation of export flows to Asian countries and the establishment of imports bypassing external restrictions contributed to GDP growth. Business adaptation to sanctions in terms of import substitution and logistics also played a role.
At the same time, Japan has long been experiencing slow economic growth, which is associated with the problem of deflation and low domestic demand, aging of the population and, consequently, the shortage of labor, as well as high social costs, concluded Vladimir Yeremkin.
Earlier it was reported that Russia's gold reserves reached a record 249 billion dollars. It also became known that meat and fish in Russia may rise sharply in price already this fall