Rate the intensity of the competition in Russian regions:methodological aspect

The article presents an analysis of the rating of Russian regions by the intensity of competition and competitive environment, created by the Federal Antimonopoly Service of the Russian Federation (FAS of Russia). The author investigates an algorithm for the formation of each of the component«subratings», wich characterize directly or indirectly the competition intensity. The author also identifies the indicators and periods, which are used for assessment the competitive environment and strength of competitive processes in Russian regions. There are some methodological mistakes found in composition of FAS’s rating. In order to value the objectivity of the rating results the author estimates correlation between the ratings of Russian regions by the competition intensity and competitive environment, rating of regions by their investment appeal and rating of regions by their socio-economic situation. Some statistic indicators like Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient between these three ratings and Kendall’s concordance coefficient between four «subratings» were calculated for evaluation the interdependence of rank order of regions within the ratings. On the base of this analysis the author found some disparate results of FAS’ rating which can be caused by identified methodological mistakes. As the result of this issue the author gives some necessary methodological changes in the methodology of FAS’s rating.