The article examines pension systems modernization in China; the evolution of the approaches to solving pension security problems in view of demographic challenges. The existing regulatory framework of funded pensions, the approaches to refill the empty accounts such as delaying retirement ages as well as abolishing one-child policy are in focus of the research. Population aged 60 or over is the fastest growing cohort, globally, according to the UN data. Currently having of its population aged 60 or over, China is one of the most rapidly ageing nations. By 2030, China will have nearly a quarter of their populations aged 60 or over. Population ageing is projected to have a profound effect on the number of workers as well as pensioners, posing the problem of underscoring the national pension systems’ adaptation to changing conditions; increasing the fiscal and political pressures that the old-age and social protection systems, health care systems are facing.

The article examines the connections between exports and employment in US; the number of jobs supported by the export of goods and services. Goods exports supports nearly 60 percent of jobs, connected with exports, mainly in manufacturing. Among the manufactured products, exports of machinery products support the greatest number of jobs, followed by chemical products, aerospace and other transportation equipment, motor vehicles and parts, and computer and electronic products. Jobs supported by exports to country and regional destinations is of special attention in view of the president D. Trump’s statements of intent to withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Jobs supported by exports to selected regions are analyzed. It’s noted that goods exports to the countries-members of the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement accounted for nearly half of all jobs supported by goods exports.

Characteristics, the current state and tendencies of Russia-East Asia inbound and outbound tourism based on statistical data are given in this article. Conclusions are formulated about the great potential of inbound tourist flows from East Asian countries into Russia and a big geopolitical importance of East Asia for Russia as a whole and its Far Eastern regions in particular. The possibilities of near-border, cultural, transit tourism within the context of massive intergovernmental projects realization is scrutinized in this article. Basic problems to solve for the sake of increasing the amount of foreign visitors and rising the state incomes from that activity are characterized.

The importance of offset for an arms importer and the purposes which the Indian government planned to achieve making offset mandatory for foreign arms suppliers are specified. The link between offset and direct foreign investment in defence industry of India is studied. The influence of offset guidelines on the change of export volumes of military products manufactured by Indian defence enterprises is showed. The analysis of the participation of Defence Public Sector Undertakings and defence private companies in offset agreements is given. The results of offset activities of foreign arms suppliers in the Republic of India are defined. It is revealed that offset agreements enable the development of national defence industry of the Republic of India.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Armenia was in a difficult economic situation. There was a question of the modernization of the economy and the need for structural reforms. However, the global financial crisis dramatically worsened the economic situation. And the state again has to look for the ways to improve the economic welfare, including the accession to various regional integration associations. The article considers the main features of the development of Armenian economy after the collapse of the Soviet Un ion. It considers the factors that have negative effect on the country’s economy. It identifies sectors, which will provide the growth of national economy, and gives an assessment of Armenia’s accession to the EAEC.

The article reveals the structural dynamics of trade turnover of the European industry markets. Also the article summarizes the results of the analysis concerning the changes in external economic specialization and geography of trade flows of the new member states of the European Union. The article emphasizes the major factors that influence on economic specialization of the European Union members and states the main contradictions of the European integration process. Trade poles with high mutual intensity of trading activities are systematized. Based on the carried out analysis the author created the forecast and recommendations for the candidate countries that pretend to join the European Union.

Technical barriers in the form of standards, sanitary and phytosanitary measures can create barriers to foreign trade flows, comparable and even exceeding the barriers caused by the tariffs regulation. A quantitative assessment of the negative impact of technical barriers on the export of pine nuts from the Russian Federation was performed. To do this, we used the gravity model, which allows to take into account the effect of technical barriers as well as the influence of other variables taken into account by the gravity model. The results indicate the greatest negative impact of Technical barriers on pine nut exports compared to the other studied variables. It is assumed that it is necessary to modernize national regulations in accordance with international requirements for products in order to reduce barriers to Russian exports.

The article describes the features of the technical regulation in the implementation of international trade in wine within the framework of the EU Customs Union and other regional entities. Ways of reducing the technical barriers by harmonizing approaches to labeling, classification of wines, to the quality and safety requirements. Examples of current differences at national and regional levels, with the confirmation of conformity of wine products as a mandatory procedure ensuring compliance with minimum security requirements: different forms of certificates and declarations, different approaches to the standardization of technical specifications. Questions of approximation of the Russian legislation and the legislation of the Customs Union with the EU norms and APEC as an effective instrument to promote exports and imports of wine products.

The article presents results of estimation the impact of tariffs and non-tariff barriers reduction on import growth from Israel to Russia. In order to obtain such estimates author have developed two-stages approach with the assumption that import elasticity from Israel to Russia is equal to mean of import elasticity from Israel to 224 countries of the world. In the first stage of the approach, criteria for selection of the most potentially interesting industrial products at the level of 6-digits of the Harmonized System 2012 are developed. In the second stage, regression coefficients of tariffs, non- tariff measures and other factors of gravity models were estimated. Three versions of gravity models were used for estimations: ordinary least squares regression, Poisson regression and Heckman two-stage approach. Estimates of gravity models with the best statistic coefficients were chosen for each product previously selected in the first stage of algorithm. Then, ad-valorem equivalents of non-tariff measures were calculated. More than 9,000 observations were analyzed for each factor in the models.