FAMINE IN RUSSIA

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21949, 5 November 1934, Page 12

FAMINE IN RUSSIA

Sir, —A Russian lady has been speaking recently in New Zealand describing the conditions of famine in Soviet Russia. Her statements have been contradicted by local writers, who seem to depend upon Soviet propaganda rather than facts. Like other people, we have to rely upon information from outside New Zealand, and it is most difficult to arrive at the truth owing to so few visitors to Russia, being able to get below the surface. In this case, however, tho fact that grave conditions of famine do exist seems beyond doubt, if one can depend upon Soviet publications in Russia itself. Those who deny the existence of famine have quoted statistics of what has been done during the Five-Year Plan, and the collectivisation of farming. Such statistics do not carry conviction in the face of official admission in the Soviet papers published iu Russia. For instance. Comrade Kassior, a high Soviet official, made a statement, published in Pravda of June last, than on many collective farms 30 per cent of the harvest was lost, and in some other regions the losses were still greater. Stalin, in February last, deplored the formidable losses of livestock. The Soviet journal Molot v in January this year, said "the food situation of 150,000 households and of '>oo,ooo men, in the Azov and Black Sea regions Mas quite uneertain." In March. 19.' H, Posticheff complained that in the Ukraine the State bad no further reserves of grain. Again, Pravda of the Fast (No. 12, 1934) said that as a result of bad administration there had been "massive degradation of agriculture and lack of products." These are only a few instances of admission of the failure of collectivisation, and certainly bear out the reports of a grave famine in certain districts, which, according to the Socialist paper Le Messager Socialiste, is responsible for 5,000,000 victims. These terrible conditions are to be deplored by everyone, but there appears to overwhelming evidence that they exist, and prove that the policy of State farming has failed to provide food for the people in a country which used to be a huge exporter of grain. N.Z. Welfare Leagui.