The article discusses the role of foreign direct investment in the economy of receiving region and country on the example of the Russian Federation and Sverdlovsk region. The positive and negative effects of foreign capital in national and regional economies are marked. A set of indicators to assess the impact of foreign direct investment in the host region economy is offered to determine the trends of attracting foreign capital in the last decade and the role of foreign direct investment in the economic development of the Sverdlovsk region and the Russian Federation. The examples of investment projects with the participation of foreign companies which were successfully implemented in the Sverdlovsk region have been considered. The conclusion about higher rates of the transnationalization of economic activity in Russia in comparison with similar processes in the Sverdlovsk region is made. In the paper, a comparative statistical analysis of the development of the economy of the country and Sverdlovsk region by attracting internal or investment resources is provided. The comparative analysis shows that the country and region economy does not depend much on the foreign direct investment inflows. With the help of the econometric analysis, we have confirmed the hypothesis about a weak impact of foreign direct investment on economic growth in the Sverdlovsk region and the Russian Federation. The results of the calculations for the Sverdlovsk Region and the Russian Federation show that domestic investment in fixed assets is the key factor for the growth of the gross regional product and the gross domestic product.

The article analyses characteristics of the participation of the Eurasian Economic Union’s (EAEU) member states in the World Trade Organization (WTO) and its impact on the Eurasian economic integration. We described the contradictions in the regulatory frameworks between the WTO agreements and regional trade agreements. Moreover, we offered the ways to overcome these contradictions. We demonstrated the role of the economic and legal exemptions that operate on the EAEU’s domestic agrarian market in connection with the accession of Russia and Kazakhstan to the WTO. On the one hand, these exemptions were shaped under the influence of tariff commitments made by Russia in the field of agriculture. On the other hand, they were formed due to Kazakhstan’s subsequent entry into the WTO and the discrepancy of its tariff obligations for agricultural products with Russia’s tariff obligations in the conditions of functioning of the EAEU’s common customs tariff. We explored Kazakhstan’s tariff commitments to the WTO. We have proved that for the EAEU’s further effective development, its participants need to initiate compensation negotiations with other WTO members in order to equalize the overall level of the import duties on the EAEU territory. The study’s results can be applied for harmonization of the tariff rates of the EAEU members. It is necessary for achieving the most effective joint economic development and implementing the coordinated foreign trade policy in various economic sectors, including agro-industrial policy and agricultural development of the EAEU states.