Return to bartering? I don't know if they ever left....I posted this report before, but it's worth posting again. It's a good explanation of Russia's virtual economy, including the role of bartering.

"Abstract: The virtual economy was the system of informal rent-distribution that arose in post-Soviet Russia in the 1990s as nonviable Soviet-era manufacturing industries sought to protect themselves from the discipline of the market. Enterprise directors and their allies throughout the economy (including government officials) colluded to use nonmarket prices and various forms of nonmonetary exchange such as barter to transfer value from resource sectors to manufacturing industry. The article discusses the system’s historical roots, describes some of its characteristic phenomena, and outlines a model for behavior of enterprises."