cooperation w ith border countries has generally been limited as they are not in the eu until recently the russian federation formed an important export market for many of the voivodeships products however the russian embargo has limited this trade for particular commodities eg apples and new markets have been sought in response notwithstanding some of the barriers the eastern market on podlaskie s doorstep has been an underutilised asset in some respects since regions have been fully responsible for a large share of european funds under cohesion policy under cohesion policy all regions in poland are defined as less developed meaning that their gdp per capita is less than of the average gdp of the eu with the exception of mazowieckie voivodeship which recently transitioned to being a more developed region and includes warsaw lessdeveloped regions are allocated a larger funding envelope