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Russia is redirecting trade away from Europe and the United States toward India, China, and other Global South markets, with friendly countries now accounting for 85% of its foreign trade, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin has said. He was speaking to the Moscow Financial Forum on Monday (September 21).
Trade with these partners reached around ₽25 trillion (US$299 billion) in the first half of 2026, with Russian exports rising 15% year-on-year. Mishustin said that “Trade with Europe and the United States is being reoriented toward the markets of China, India, Central Asia, Africa, and the Middle East.”
The shift extends beyond commodities and energy, Moscow’s biggest exports. Russia’s non-resource and non-energy exports to friendly countries increased 11% in the first half of the year. Russian Industry and Trade Minister Anton Alikhanov said earlier this month that Russia’s overall non-commodity and non-energy exports reached US$58.8 billion in H1 2026, up 3% from a year earlier. Chemicals, fertilizers, metals, and pharmaceuticals were among the sectors that recorded growth.
There are several component-friendly country elements to this trade. Bilateral trade between Russia and China rose 25.6% year-on-year in H1 2026, reaching US$134.2 billion. Non-energy examples are here, here and here.
India has also emerged as an important part of Moscow’s trade expansion effort. Bilateral trade grew by 8% year-on-year in H1 2026, reaching US$32.4 billion. Non-energy examples are here, here and here.
Türkiye is another major trade partner, with bilateral trade between Russia and Türkiye amounting to US$49.1 billion last year. H1 2026 results have not been released, but it is known that their agricultural trade has grown by 30% in the first six months of this year.
Russia’s trade with the ASEAN bloc reached US$21.6 billion in 2025, with 2026 growth at 10%.
The Eurasian Economic Union and Commonwealth of Independent States countries also all showed trade increases with Russia in H1 2026. Although Armenia’s trade declined, this was offset entirely by a significant growth in Mongolia’s bilateral trade, up over 18% this year. These are these countries’ H1 2026 trade figures:
Belarus: US$29.3 billion, up 12.5%
Kazakhstan: US$14.6 billion, up 15%
Kyrgyzstan: US$1.1 billion, up 17%
Tajikistan: US$1.54 billion, up 25%
Turkmenistan: US$971 million, up 21%
Uzbekistan: US$6.97 billion, up 12%
In the Middle East, trade data has been difficult to come by in recent months due to disruptions caused by problems in Iran and with Saudi Arabia. Russia’s trade with the Gulf Cooperation Council members reached nearly US$4 billion last year.
Russia’s trade with African nations reached US$27.7 billion last year, and while H1 2026 results are not released, we do know that their agricultural trade increased by 35% in H1 2026. Trade with the Latin American Mercosur bloc, driven mainly by Brazil, reached about US$12 billion last year, with 2026 growth rates of about 7%.
As can be seen, the overall trade growth for Russia is highly positive in terms of the outreach to the Global South. This represents a significant trade policy shift that has been underway in Russia since 2014 but accelerated sharply from 2022 onwards.
With Russia’s total trade expected to reach about US$2.66 trillion for 2026, the share of that held by the West-principally the European Union, the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand-now amounts to about US$399 billion and continues to decline. With Russia and China targeting a bilateral trade figure of US$300 billion by 2030, and Russia and India a target of US$100 billion by the same timeframe, Russia’s trade volumes with just these two countries alone will be more than its trade with the entire Western bloc combined.
