Crisis in Soviet Agriculture:

...the officials in those regions which were exempted from compulsory deliveries "ceased to bother about grain...

...Neither the holding of a plenary session for this purpose nor the appearance of criticism are in themselves signs of serious trouble...

...However, this policy is being abandoned...

...While he urges from time to time that Party officials take a realistic account of possibilities, those who submit a moderate plan for their locality are apt to receive the rough edge of his tongue...

...Why, then, did the plenary session sound so much like an inquest on failure...

...Perhaps the most important reason is that the Kremlin envisaged a year of rapid agricultural growth, and the relative stagnation was therefore a conspicuous example of unfulfillment...

...On the last day of discussion Khrushchev delivered an angry speech-and frequently interrupted the proceedings with stormy outbursts-denouncing in particular falsifications of output and delivery figures by Party officials...

...And such things, comrades, are at times done by Communists...

...One of his senior provincial officials had ordered farms to buy butter in the state shops for delivery to the state...

...In pursuit of this policy, many provinces had been wholly or partly exempted from compulsory deliveries of grain to the state...

...This has created severe shortages...

...The Premier also realizes that with the population increasing by three million annually, and with meat, milk and vegetable supplies to many towns poor or irregular, the need for higher agricultural output is urgent...

...Another source of worry has been the so-called virgin lands -areas of Kazakhstan and Siberia plowed in 1954 and after...

...This makes it all the more necessary for yields to be raised in other parts of the Soviet Union...

...But the reasons for them were not frankly discussed at the session, perhaps because some of the blame would then have shown up as Khrushchev's...

...Khrushchev's proposals have led to the reduction of this ministry to the status of an advisory and research body...

...In fact, not only did they reduce grain production, including fodder grain, but they increased their demands for grain from state stocks...

...Khrushchev spoke of the need for returning to the practice of demanding grain deliveries to the state from all parts of the country...

...He strongly pressed for the adoption of more ambitious maize targets in the Ukraine and the North Caucasus than anything ever recorded there, even under the most favorable conditions...

...There are plans for introducing proper crop rotations, quickmaturing seeds and a whole list of other measures necessary to set things right...

...These views can be politely characterized as remarkable...

...But this seems to overestimate the role which Party secretaries can play in the revival of agriculture...

...Admissions of such falsification were made by the Party leaders of the Russian Republic, the Ukraine and Kirghizia...

...the grain harvest was actually slightly higher this year (about 4 per cent) than in 1959...

...Khrushchev is aware of the dangers of overcentralization, and evidently hopes that efficient and knowledgeable provincial Party secretaries can be found who will carry out the central policies with elasticity and with due regard for local conditions...

...But yields are not increasing, especially in the central, northern and western provinces of European Russia...

...It is quite wrong to say, as some commentators have said, that 1960 was a disastrous year in the virgin lands...

...The obverse of these feverish efforts is their inactivity in those sectors which are not the subject of pressure from above...

...The farm management and the peasants must be provided with more encouragement, given greater incentives, and above all, they and their agronomists must be assured of greater freedom to plan the farm's activities...

...The Kirghiz Party leader, Iskhak Razzakov, had a similar story to tell...

...Now 1960 was not a disastrous year for Soviet agriculture...

...This already is compelling Podgorny and his colleagues to disrupt existing crop rotations and issue drastic orders to the farms to sow more maize on their best lands...

...Grain purchases by the state would, it was hoped, be confined to the low-cost regions of the south and east...

...The 1960 harvest there was moderate to fair, but it provided a substantial share in state procurements of grain...

...For many years there have been complaints about the arbitrary interference of Party officials...

...However, it is at the farm that the actual work is done...

...Despite occasional declarations to the contrary, there is ample evidence to show that the collective farms generally are not free to decide either what to produce or how to produce it...

...Polyanski went on to cite instances where Party officials compelled farms to deliver seed grain to the state, so as to be able to claim the fulfillment of delivery plans...

...his sense of humor seemed to desert him when this subject came up at the sessions...

...In the last few years, they tended to grant somewhat more local autonomy in the choice of crops...

...Far from punishing- him, the Kirghiz Party leadership promoted this official to the post of Minister of the Interior for the Kirghiz Republic...

...and the law of averages may provide one in 1961...

...It is virtually certain that the acreage sown to grain in the formerly virgin lands will have to be reduced, in order to rest the soil and to deal with weed infestation...

...Such facts have been uncovered in Yaroslav, Kirov, Tula, Ryazan, Lipetsk and other provinces...

...Khrushchev even declared that half of the harvest must have been stolen by the peasants, and that it was biologically impossible for the harvest to have been so small because the sowing of maize, according to him, guarantees at least twice the reported crop...

...Premier Khrushchev had predicted that the Soviet Union could overtake the United States in milk and meat production and that the grain harvest could increase enough to provide the necessary fodder for greatly expanded livestock herds...

...By insisting on the adoption of unrealistic targets, and by making it clear that the credit and future career of local Party officials depend on their performance, the Premier places them in an intolerable dilemma...

...In pursuit of unrealistic targets of meat production and deliveries, they bought and slaughtered a large proportion of the privately owned cows, and even compelled collective farms to deliver breeding bulls for meat, raising the proportion of barren cows in the province spectacularly from 4 to 30 per cent...

...Angered by Soviet failure to fulfill last year's ambitious crop quotas, Khrushchev claims errant Party officials have created a CRISIS IN SOVIET AGRICULTURE By Alec Nove It has become a regular feature of Soviet life for the Communist party's Central Committee to review -and criticize-Soviet agriculture about this time every year...

...It required Khrushchev's personal intervention, as the Premier did not fail to point out at the session, for steps to be taken against the official...

...The amount of acreage under grain has declined in this whole area, and the reason for the fall is an interesting one, since it demonstrates the continuing dilemma of the authorities...

...Indeed, their role has been increased at the expense of the Ministry of Agriculture...

...This must mean that the task of planning and the issuance of instructions to farms is more than ever to be concentrated in the hands of the Communist party hierarchy, while state purchases are to be the responsibility of a newly set-up state procurements committee...

...Local officials persist in sowing grain year after year, causing soil exhaustion, weed infestation and, here and there, wind erosion...

...But despite all this the plan will not be fulfilled and the unfortunate local officials will shoulder the blame, while other crops will suffer from neglect...

...there has been no serious drought in these regions for three years...

...Khrushchev interjected angrily: "We must say, comrades, that it is incredible when butter is bought [by farms] in shops, and this butter is included by the collective farm as part of its plan-fulfillment and it is delivered to the state...

...A fantastic story was told of the Party officials in the fertile North Caucasus province of Stavropol...

...The bulk of the plenary session speeches, above all Khrushchev's own interjections, show a touching faith in the healing effects of leadership (by Party secretaries) and in the value of exhortation and setting ambitious targets...

...Equally important, Party officials in the provinces respond in whatever way possible to the current Party campaign...

...The real difficulties have been scarcely touched...

...Left to themselves, local officials and farm directors make the wrong choices because they have no economic stimulus to make the right ones...

...There also was a big decline in the number of sheep and collective farms suffered very severe financial losses...

...Yet such control carries with it other dangers, including bureaucratization and failure to adapt the plans to local circumstances...

...Alec Nove, a specialist in Russian social and economic affairs, is now at the London School of Economics...

...The persistently modest maize harvests in most parts of the Soviet Union seem to be a source of great irritation to Khrushchev...

...Yet the plan was not fulfilled, despite the absence of drought, and there were heavy losses of grain in the fields and in storage...

...Yet such methods are bound to lead to the same kind of errors-pressure on farms and disruption of sound farming practicesas have been so sharply criticized at the plenary session...

...Khrushchev's personal insistence on more maize constitutes a striking example of such pressure...

...They consequently exercise pressure on their subordinates, give detailed orders to the nominally "independent" collective farms and in many instances falsify the figures or in other ways insist on acts damaging or adversely affecting the collective farms...

...Dmitri Polyanski of the Russian Republic said: "In order to create the appearance of success, such officials deceive the Party and the Government, engage in falsification, add to and include in their accounts produce which is neither produced nor delivered...

...The object was to encourage specialization, and in particular the use of grain resources for fodder as part of the build-up of the livestock industry...

...Freed from pressure from the top...

...This experience shows once more the effects of relying on administrative orders instead of on economic inducements in the planning of agriculture...

...It is a distortion, it is speculation, indeed not speculation but a major crime...

...The principal speeches at the plenary session put great stress on replacing the inefficient secretaries with competent leaders...

...It is he who insisted, and continues to insist, on the adoption of extremely ambitious targets...

...The Party and the people need not a fictional but a real increase in production...

...Khrushchev must understand this well: He refused to accept bad weather as an explanation for failure and instead chastised the Party officials responsible for insuring progress...

...There, rainfall is adequate but the soil requires heavy applications of fertilizer and lime and gets little of either: Polyanski named a long catalogue of provinces in which grain harvests remain persistently low, in some cases even below the modest levels achieved in 1940...

...Moreover, the principal cause of harvest failure in the Soviet Union is drought, and 1960 saw no serious drought...

...In the last analysis it is they, and not the Party officials, who know best what can be done on their farm...

...True, the harvest of most crops was well below the record year of 1958, but this could legitimately be blamed on serious losses from frost, a late and cold Spring, dust storms and other natural hazards...

...Of course, nothing but good can come from the dismissal of dishonest or tyrannical officials...

...Compared with such targets the 1960 results were extremely disappointing, particularly in the case of meat and milk...

...Nor was the weather a sufficient excuse, for while it was less favorable than in 1958, it was better than average...

...At the plenary session he refused to listen to the Ukrainian Party secretary, Nikolai Podgorny, who tried to give the reasons for the modest maize harvest...

...These and other falsifications understandably aroused Khrushchev to anger...

...In addition, inadequate housing and amenities in the new settlements have led to labor problems, and farm machinery is seldom repaired and maintained properly...

...Yet the emphasis remains on strengthening the powers and role of the Party officials...

...The news from Moscow about this year's conference, however, suggests that the Party leadership is unusually alarmed about agricultural shortcomings...

...Party officials are in control, and they act on orders from above...

...Unless a significant improvement can be recorded under average conditions, the prospects of Soviet agriculture are bleak...

...yet it continues to occur because of the pressure from above...

...the new minister, Mikhail Olshansky, is an ex-professor...

...However, the menace of drought remains...

...Unfortunately," commented Polyanski, "such facts occur not only in the Stavropol province...

...There is no need to prove that the guilty must be brought to severe account...

...To cope with these difficulties, a Party organization for the virgin lands area has been created...

...In these circumstances, decentralization cannot work, and a return to a more detailed control from the center is unavoidable...