Proposals for the Formation of a Transport and Logistics Cluster as an Institution of Regional Development (on the Example of Donetsk Economic Region

One of the dynamic and rapid lines of development of modern regional ecosystems is transport logistics as an effective source of competitive advantages. This requires the use of new tools to improve the competitive ability of regions, including the cluster approach, the essence of which is the formation and development of transport and logistic clusters by consolidating the efforts of the state, business, science, education in priority fields of economic activity. As international practice shows, the implementation of the cluster model of logistic activities will contribute to the reduction of total logistic costs by 12-35% as a result of reducing transport costs by 7-20% and the cost of handling operations by 20-30%, as well as accelerating the speed of circulation of material resources by 20-40%. Therefore, the creation of transport and logistic clusters will create favorable conditions for the growth of the volume and quality of transport and logistics services and create a qualitatively new model of the regional economy. It was found that the formation and effective functioning of transport and logistic cluster in the Donetsk economic region is hampered by many key barriers that can be conditionally classified into the following groups, such as political, foreign economic, institutional, investment and financial, infrastructure, environmental, information, logistics.