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The breakthrough of socialist agriculture
Starting in 1933, agricultural production rose most years. The year before collectivization, the cereal harvest attained 71.7 million tonnes. In 1930, there was an exceptional harvest of 83.5 million tonnes. In 1931 and 1932, the Soviet Union was in the depth of the crisis, due to socio-economic upheavals, to desperate kulak resistance, to the little support that could be given to peasants in these crucial years of industrial investment, to the slow introduction of machines and to drought. Grain production fell to 69.5 and to 69.9 million tonnes. Then, there were three successive harvests from 1933 to 1935 of 89.8, 89.4 and 90.1 million tonnes. Particularly bad climactic conditions produced the worst harvest, in 1936, of 69.3 million tonnes, but its effects were mitigated by reserves and good planning of distribution. The next year, there was a record harvest of 120.9 million tonnes, followed by high levels of 95.0, 105.0 and 118.8 million between 1938 and 1940.
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Ibid. , p. 82.
Socialist agriculture dramatically rose as soon as the considerable industrial and agricultural investments had an effect. The total value of agricultural production stagnated between 1928 and 1934, oscillating between 13.1 billion rubles and 14.7 billion rubles. Then it rose to 16.2 billion in 1935, to 20.1 billion in 1937, and 23.2 billion in 1940.
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Ibid. , p. 89.
A peasant population rising from 120.7 to 132 million people between 1926 and 1940 was able to feed an urban population that increased from 26.3 to 61 million in the same period.
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Ibid. , p. 93.
The kolkhozian consumption in 1938 had increased, in terms of percentage of peasant consumption under the former régime, to: bread and flour, 125; potatoes, 180; fruit and vegetables, 147; milk and dairy products, 148; meat and sausage, 179.
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Ibid. , p. 113, n. 1.
Fri Aug 25 09:03:42 PDT 1995