One of the three so-called "matryoshka" subordinate entities of the Russian Federation: it is part of the Tyumen Oblast and simultaneously a subordinate entity of the Russian Federation. It is located in the north of Western Siberia. The whole territory of the district lays in the Far North region. The region's economy is based on oil and gas production. Yamalo-Nenets AD is among the leaders in the production of the gross regional product.
The Okrug was formed in 1930 in the Ural region. Later it was a part of the Ob-Irtysh and Omsk regions, and in 1944 it was included in the Tyumen Oblast. In 1991, the Yamalo-Nenets District adopted a declaration of sovereignty and became a subordinate entity of the Russian Federation.
The titular ethnic group is the Nenets - the Samoyed people inhabiting the Eurasian coast of the Arctic Ocean from the Kola Peninsula to Taimyr. Nenets are divided into European and Asian (Siberian). They are the most numerous out of the indigenous peoples of the Russian North. Language is the defining marker of their differences from the titular nation of the country. Nenets language belongs to the Samoyed group of the Uralic language family and consists of two dialects - tundra and forest. Traditionally, the Nenets are pagans, but at the present, most of them have adopted Orthodoxy.
According to the All-Russian Population Census of 2010, the majority of the population are Russians (61.7%) (Ukrainians (9.7%), Tatars (5.6%)). The share of the titular ethnic group - the Nenets - is only 5.9%.
The interethnic tension in the district is connected to the contradictions between representatives of indigenous peoples and oil and gas producing companies, as well as with the spread of radical Islam among migrants from the southern regions of the country, whose share in connection with the needs of the development of the oil and gas industry is increasing.
