The Press WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 31, 1962. Soviet Agriculture

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29735, 31 January 1962, Page 12

The Press WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 31, 1962. Soviet Agriculture

It is no satisfaction to the Dominion that recent Russian purchases of New Zealand mutton are a minor consequence of serious difficulties in Soviet agriculture. The central figure in this drama is Mr Khrushchev himself, who continues to condemn the errors of Stalinist administrators, and to exhort Soviet farmers generally to more strenuous efforts. Among the domestic issues that will determine Mr Khrushchev’s future power perhaps the most important is agriculture. In other Soviet industries growth is still vigorous; the official estimate for 1961 was 9.2 per cent In agriculture Mr Khrushchev’s record has been uneven and (in recent months) disappointing. Since 1958, for example, grain production has lagged behind the targets; last year meat was also short. Russia’s ability to expand food production according to Mr Khrushchev’s schedule for the next 20 years appears doubtful Taking the United States as their pacemaker, the Russians have aimed to correlate rising living standards with increased industrial output; but the productivity of Russian farmers—upon which social advances largely depend—is still very low compared with that of their American counterparts. Mr Khrushchev well knows how damaging to the Communist cause everywhere are reports of Russia’s agricultural shortcomings. He can derive little comfort from reflecting on China’s relatively worse plight. Th * gravity of agricultural problems may be gauged from Mr Khrushchev’s assumption of persona] responsibility for finding the remedies. The Soviet Premier is believed to be specially concerned about carelessness and mismanagement on collective

farms. Machinery has been allowed to deteriorate; land improvement schemes have been inadequate; and too big an area has been left fallow or under grass, mctead of being cropped. Mr Khrushchev’s objectives include introducing new methods that will permit bigger yields of meat, milk, ana other staple foodstuffs. H* has associated a campaign against perennial pastures—and in favour of growing more maize, sugar beet, beans, and peas—with an attempt to increase the proportion of livestock that is collectively owned. Thus, sometimes Mr Khrushchev’s ideological policy conflicts with better farming counsels, and provokes resistance among the farmers.

But Mr Khrushchev’s case is strengthened by the Soviet Union’s rapidly developing technical resources, its rising output of fertilisers, and much bigger grants to agriculture. Apart from politics, however, formidable obstacles remain. They include the farmers’ reluctance to exert themselves more without additional incentives, such as an assurance that individual “private” earnings will not be cut; a shortage of livestock from which to breed superior flocks and herds; and the technical complexities of replanning productive patterns in a vast country, beset by climatic vagaries, and including much barren terrain. Cracks in the world facade of communism show how vitally Mr Khrushchev needs domestic harmony and balanced economic growth to support him in the ideological strife. Agricultural insufficiency not only threatens the present regime in Moscow; it could impair irreparably the appeal of Russian communism to the ill-fed, illiterate, and politically immature masses of the undeveloped countries.