Changing economic priorities: agriculture

Question 1

From Stalin’s death to 1958, what did Soviet leaders remain convinced about?

Answer 1

That Stalin’s economic model would one day overtake capitalist economics

Question 2

How did Khrushchev’s reforms lead to further optimism following on from Stalin’s economics?

Answer 2

Between 1956 and 1958, the Soviet economy performed well

Question 3

From 1959, what was economic growth like?

Answer 3

Slowed down and within a decade, the economy was stagnant

Question 4

What did Khrushchev recognise economic growth had led to?

Answer 4

An extremely inefficient agricultural sector

Question 5

What did Khrushchev do about the extremely inefficient agricultural sector?

Answer 5

Introduced important reforms in Soviet agriculture

Question 6

How did Khrushchev increase incentives in agriculture?

Answer 6

Paid farmers higher prices for their produce

Question 7

By what percentage did farmers income boost by between 1952 and 1956 because of Khrushchev’s incentives?

Answer 7

250%

Question 8

Why did Khrushchev launch the Virgin Land Scheme?

Answer 8

To increase the amount of land that was being farmed

Question 9

Where did Khrushchev create new farms upon launching the Virgin Land Scheme?

Answer 9

Northern Caucasus
Kazakhstan
Western Siberia

Question 10

Khrushchev tried to make farming more efficient by investing in what?

Answer 10

Artificial fertilisers
Tractors

Question 11

What percentage did production boost by due to artificial fertilisers?

Answer 11

40%

Question 12

What percentage did production boost by due to tractors?

Answer 12

30%

Question 13

Compare investment in agriculture, in percentage of Soviet budget, in 1954 vs in 1959.

Answer 13

1954 = 3% of Soviet budget

1959 = 12.8% of Soviet budget

Question 14

Khrushchev’s policies were initially highly successful.
True or false?

Answer 14

True

Question 15

Overall, what percentage did agricultural production increase by from 1954 to 1958?

Answer 15

35.3%

Question 16

Because of his early successes, what did Khrushchev do?

Answer 16

Set a hugely ambitious target of overtaking US farm production by 1960

Question 17

Under Khrushchev, between what years did agricultural problems happen?

Answer 17

1954-64

Question 18

In spite of initial success, there were still fundamental problems with Soviet agriculture.
Give some examples of these problems.

Answer 18

Inefficiency
Slow growth
On-going problems e.g., poor performance

Question 19

How did the Virgin Land Scheme mean that Soviet agriculture remained highly inefficient?

Answer 19

It required complex irrigation systems which made the cost of production high

Question 20

Other than the Virgin Land Scheme, in what way was Soviet agriculture inefficient?

Answer 20

Agriculture was extremely labour-intensive

Question 21

How was agriculture extremely labour-intensive compared to the US?

Answer 21

During 1950s and 1960s, around 50% of Soviet population worked in agriculture, compared to 5% in the US.

Question 22

Despite having a lower amount of the population working in agriculture, what did the US manage to do?

Answer 22

Produced double the amount of food produced by Soviet agriculture

Question 23

Between what years did agricultural growth slow down under Khrushchev?

Answer 23

1959 and 1964

Question 24

Between 1959 and 1964, what percentage did farm production increase by?

Answer 24

15%

Question 25

What did the 15% increase in farm production, 1959-64, mean for Khrushchev?

Answer 25

Soviet agriculture failed to meet his target of overtaking the USA in food production

Question 26

What significant economic problems was poor performance as a result of?

Answer 26

Central planning
Khrushchev repeatedly reforming ministries dealing with agriculture
Soviet farms often had inadequate storage facilities
Pay for industrial workers increased

Question 27

Why did pay for industrial workers increasing result in poor performance?

Answer 27

It remained inadequate for the farmers

Question 28

Why did central planning result in poor performance?

Answer 28

Meant that farmers did not always use the correct fertiliser at the right time so it often went to wast

Question 29

Why did Khrushchev repeatedly reforming the ministries dealing with agriculture result in poor performance?

Answer 29

Contradictory reforms led to administrative confusion

Question 30

Why did Soviet farms having inadequate storage facilities lead to poor performance?

Answer 30

Some of the food produced was wasted

Question 31

What happened to reform after Khrushchev as a result of the failure of his reforms and they instability they created?

Answer 31

Leading Communists reversed his reforms after 1964
Communist leaders rejected the very idea of reform after Khrushchev

Question 32

What did Brezhnev do to agriculture between 1964 and 1985?

Answer 32

Was content to manage system Stalin had set up
Largely abandoned attempts to make agriculture more productive
Rather, authorised large-scale grain imports from the West to keep food prices low

Question 33

How was Brezhnev able to buy large-scale grain imports from the West?

Answer 33

Sold oil and used some of the money from this to fund food imports

Question 34

Why was Brezhnev able to sell oil and receive imports of food?

Answer 34

Oil prices were high during the 1970s and therefore selling oil generated a great deal of income for the Soviet Union