Minsk Region
Minsk Region exhibits keystone dynamics: 24.4% of Belarus's investment flows to capital's orbit, 650K workers, nuclear plant supplying 35.8% of electricity.
Minsk Region operates as Belarus's keystone territory—a doughnut surrounding the capital that captures 24.4% of national fixed capital investment (January-May 2024), highest among oblasts. The region employs 650,000 workers, second only to Minsk city's one million. This isn't accident but deliberate source-sink dynamics: January 2024 legislation explicitly prioritized regional projects to disperse investment beyond the capital, yet the orbit of Minsk still dominates.
The oblast's economic logic follows gravity. Enterprises locate here for capital access without capital costs; workers commute from the region to serve Minsk's economy. Belarus's nuclear power plant (operational 2020) produced 35.8% of national electricity by 2024—15.7 TWh—from this region. The Soligorsk potash deposits supply one of Belarus's few genuinely competitive export industries.
But proximity to power has costs. When Western sanctions targeted Belarus, Minsk Region's integrated industries felt the pressure first. The IT sector that once contributed 5.5% of GDP and $2 billion in exports concentrated heavily in the capital area; when 15,000 tech workers fled after 2020, this region lost the most. Investment now flows through state-directed bank lending rather than foreign capital—the 2025 mandate for 16% increased investment lending reflects this shift from market to command.