THIRD FIVE-YEAR PLAN EVOLVED

Dominion, Volume 30, Issue 255, 24 July 1937, Page 3 (Supplement)

THIRD FIVE-YEAR PLAN EVOLVED

Soviet Programme \ TO GO INTO EFFECT ON JANUARY 1 The Soviet Union’s third Five-Year Blan, designed this time “to overtake and surpass America,” to-day was taking form in the hands of the nation’s industrial leaders, stated an Associated Press message to the “New York Tinies” on June 6. It probably will go into effect next January 1, immediately on completion of the second Five-Year Plan. Though the plans which must be submitted to the Kremlin by July I are incomplete, figures published indicate the Government hopes to accomplish more in the third period than, the combined achievements of the first and second Five-Year Plans.

The second plan already has been pronounced a success by Soviet officials and the nation’s industrial architects are looking forward to the seventh and eighth Five-Year Plans that will not bo finished until 1960 and 1965.

The planners assume a population increase of 125,000,000 within the next 25 years to raise the present 175,000,000 to 300,000,000. The Russian birth rate has nearly doubled since the 1936 decree encouraging large families. The prime goal of the next period will be increase of Russian labour’s productivity, still admittedly inefficient when compared with America’s labour standards.

“The American’s labour efficiency is two or three times higher than ours” is a frequent declaration of industrial officials who have been sent in a constant stream to the United States to learn about American production.

The Russians already are.a little disdainful about the rest of Europe, asserting that in key industries they lead all other European nations. “Europe can teach us little more; America can teach us much,” Anasthasius I. Mikoyan, Commissar of the Food Industry, declared when he returned from the United States recently. Many others have echoed his statement.

Some observers believe this means the Soviet Union will concentrate its buying in the United States during the next five years, turning from Great Britain and Germany. Already there is a trend in that direction, the Russians .showing their feeling that only the United States is big and experienced enough to appreciate Russia’s gigantic industrial problems. The Soviet Union hopes to lead the world iu gold, coal and steel production, civil aviation and agricultural production before 1942. Leadership in tractor and threshing combine production already is claimed, and aeroplane production is believed to be ahead of any other country.

Though a big increase in automobile production is planned, it is believed the Russians will trail the United States in this field for many years, although now they are second only to Great Britain in Europe. 'The complex State Planning Commission ‘co-ordinates the national programme. Thousands of engineers under orders from the Kremlin work out both broad principles and essential details years in advance.

Soviet economists expect, consumers’ goods—commodities which fill tlie ordinary needs of the average man —to become more plentiful, better and cheaper in the next five years. Tlie Russians have encountered difficulty in this branch of industry, which was somewhat neglected while capitalgoods industries were pushed.