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New stage in USSR

FARMING IN THE 70’s

When Soviet Premier Kosygin
recently stated that the USSR
expects to pass the present
level of U.S. industrial and farm
production by 1975, he was
talking about the five-year plan,
which set not only the targets
but also the ways they would be
reached.

That means farming too, be-
cause under socialism, despite
the vagaries of the weather,
agriculture is also developed
according to plan and not “by
God and by guess.”

Can farming be planned? It
certainly can— when the land
resources are owned by the peo-
ple as a whole with large-scale
socialist agricultural enterpris-
es, which are operated either as

Sakartvello tea-plucking combines at work on the Ingirsky state

farm (Georgian SSR).

8

Rice harvesting on the Druzhba collective farm in Kuban.

+

MS
: * 3
Much

state farms or as_ collective
farms, i.e., producers’ coopera-
tives that hold their land in per-
petuity.

How is the Soviet Union plan-
ning to assure that big boost
for agriculture? The measures
(for 1971-75) are as follows:

e Capital investment of 129,-
000 million roubles (roughly
$150,000 million) of state and
collective farm funds to _ in-
crease output.

e Provide 1,700,000 tractors,
more than double the machinery
for the mechanization of live-

-stock breeding, raise production

of mineral: fertilizer: from 55.4
to 90 million tons.

e Add. 3.2 million hectares
(1 hectare equals nearly 2.5

Ses:

etiel Batts

attention is being paid in the Soviet Union to the develop-

ment of poultry farming. The production of poultry meat and eggs is
steadily rising. By the end of the current five-year plan period (1975)
585 large poultry farms will be expanded and built. On state farms
alone 1.3 million tons of poultry meat and 46,700 million eggs will be
produced annually. Photo shows a duck farm in the Krasnodar Terri-
tory with three man-made pools which handles 160,000 ducks. Only
12 workers are requiredto operate it.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, DECEMBER 10, 1971—PAGE 10

acres) of presently arid lands
to the area under cultivation by
irrigation and also add by dry-
ing 5.5 million hectares of
marshland. Irrigate 41 million
hectares of pastures.

These mesures are expected
to raise productivity of the land
under cultivation by 30% and
at the same time add 8.7 million
hectares of new farmland to
that area.

That’s not wishful thinking

_ but practical planning.

It is accompanied by impor-
tant changes in the financial re-
turns of the workers of the soil
and the character of agriculture.

e The total profit of the
state-run farms in 1972 is ex-
pected to be 5,000 million rou-
bles (that’s .after wages and
operating expenses haye been
covered, of course). The state
will return over 4,500, million
roubles to those farms to ex-
pand production, increase in-
centives to farm workers, etc.

e The profit made by collec-
tive farms belongs wholly to
them, of course, to do with as
they wish, and will rise in about
the same proportion as that of
state farms.

Thus both types of socialist
farming will leave the means to
expand and intensify. agricul-
tural operatians. Each farm will
do its own planning and invest-
ment under the coordination of
the country-wide plan.

But that’s only half the story.

This expansion and intensifi-
cation is aimed at switching
over the whole of agriculture to
an industrial basis, i.e., to farm-
ing factory-style with machin-
ery doing the bulk of the labor
and control, the maximum ap-
plication of science.

There are some examples of
such farming in Canada, too, but
they take place by ruining and
ruthlessly -squeezing out not
only the family farm but even
large individual capitalist-type
farms.

In the Soviet Union this is
being accomplished not by des-
troying but by building up the
state and collective farms, not
by ruining but enriching the
men and women who work on
them. |

How is it done?

e The state fixes purchase
vrices for farm produce at a
level to ensure its profitability.
(The farms themselves decide
on which crops they will grow
—having in mind, naturally, the
overall plan and the needs of
the country as a whole; both
collective farms and individual
members of them can sell sur-
plus products on the open
market at whatever price they
wish.)

e The state facilitates by
scientific and technical aid in
personnel and equipment, the
optimum specialization of farms.

e The state provides credits
in the form of construction ma-
terials, machines, etc., to quick-
ly become large and efficient

enterprises.

(Labor made “surplus”. by
technology is employed in
building of local industries

either by the collective farm it-
self or the state.)

So there seems to be every-
thing provided to make it pos-
sible to do the job as planned
by 1975.

on article by APN
observer A. Strelyany.)

This year 135,000 hectares of land are to be dried in the agai
while on the whole for the five-year period (1971-75) 750,000 hee
of dried land will be made available for farming.

Over 110,000 cotton-pickers have been turned out by the
farm machinery plant, (Tashselmash) in Uzbekistan. Machin
ing the trade mark of this enterprise are working in the
cotton-growing republics of the Soviet Union. They have 4
their worth on the plantations of many other countries.

Tashke
es a |

of
fields owl

Iso he

Photo §

the main assembly line of the Tashselmash plant. |

Canadian farm exper
study Soviet methods

OTTAWA — A group of 12
Canadian agriculture experts is
taking part in an agri-business
mission to the USSR from Dec.
6 to 18. Headed by Dr. R. P.
Poirier, Assistant Deputy Min-
ister, Economics, Department of
Agriculture,
visit Soviet agriculture installa-
tions and institutions and hold
discussions with government, of-
ficials.

Purpose of the mission is to
explore opportunities for the
exchange of information and
technology, with a view ‘to
establishing licensing arrange-
ments and, eventually, increased
trade between the two countries
in the agri-business sector.

The mission will also examine
the terms of reference for an
agriculture working group,
which could be set up under the
Canada-USSR Mixed Commis-
sion established under the Can-
ada-USSR. Agreement. for Co-
operation in the Industrial Ap-
plication of Science and Tech-
nology.

Minister of Industry, Trade
and Commerce Jean-Luc Pepin
signed this Agreement when he
led a mission to Moscow last
January. He is co-chairman of
the Commission.

the mission will -

The mission’s itinerall | |
cludes visits to a meat Pea |
sing plant in Moscow, 4 oh
bine factory at Taga ov |
cattle breeding farm at ae |
state farm at Krasnoda —.
various scientific resear@y |
tutes. j

In addition to Dr. Polt
group includes: o

D. R. Moffatt, mecha
transport branch, Depart
Industry, Trade and Comm |

A. A. Hunt, agricultul® ig
eries and food products
Department of Industfy,
and Commerce; 1

Dr. J. W. G. Nichols0P
search station, FrederictO™
Department of Agricultur” sid

G. L. Locking, dairy #Y
Department of Agricultulé " sl

H. Ukrainetz, reseat@ atch
tion, University of S45” iui
wan, Department of A

P. Pakosh, chairma®, © w
ile Manufacturing Lt@» |
nipeg, Man. al ma

C. N. Mitchell, genet 14
ager, Jamesway Company
Preston, Ont. carts

W. Reed-Lewis, dire¢ ine
marketing, . Farm
World Wide, Masse
Ltd., Toronto, Ont.

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