Rural Housing, Food and Work

Question 1

4 points

What was rural housing like for the majority of the period?

Answer 1

• Consisted of a single-room wooden hut (izba) heated by an oven.
• Overcrowed, often shared with cows.
• Cheap to construct and, once built, peasants had control over how the izba was used.
• Still very poor housing conditions.

Question 2

4 points

How did Stalin and Khrushchev change rural housing?

Answer 2

• Stalin saw construction of ‘special’ housing blocks on the periphery of collective farms.
• Khrushchev took this further to construct self-contained ‘agro towns’.
• They became very overcroweded, and residents found themselves subject to public health problems experienced in towns and cities.
• Displaced Kulaks suffered worse conditions. When forced from their properties they were usually dumped in barraks or given tent accomodation in a field.

Question 3

5 points

What was food availability like overall during the period?

Answer 3

• Whole period characterised by intermittent food shortages and full blown famines. This is due to:
  * Overreliance on grain.
  * Restrictive practices of the mir.
  * Severe weather conditions.
  * Government policies.

Question 4

4 points

What consequences did the famine of 1891 have?

Answer 4

• Bad weather led to food shortages.
• Government raised taxes in consumer goods, so people had to pay more for everyday items.
• To afford these, they sold their grain surpluses, exacberating food shortages.
• 350,000 people died.

Question 5

4 points

What consequences did the food shortage of 1918 have?

Answer 5

• Valuable agricultural land was lost due to treaty of Brest-Litovsk, and peasants continued to hoard food.
• Bolsheviks responded by introducing grain requisitioning, meaning most foodstuffs went to towns / cities.
• Kulaks were blamed and persecuted. Peasants reacted angrily, resorting to violent protests and refusing to sign up to collectives.
• By 1920, the Cheka and Red Army had been instructed to seize all food supplies for redistribution and not simply surpluses, including the following years’ seed grain.

Question 6

4 points

What consequences did the famine of 1921 have?

Answer 6

• Brought about as a combination of Bolshevik policies and droughts followed by severe winters.
• Ukrainian food production fell by 20%.
• Due to civil war there was almost a complete shutdown of the rail system, making it difficult to transport produce.
• 5 million died.

Question 7

4 points

What were conditions like in the countryside 1926 - 1928?

Answer 7

• Decent harvests 1926 - 1927.
• However, bad weather and the fact that peasants had reduced area of land to be sown led to food shortages in 1928.
• Kulaks blamed for hoarding grain, led to requisitioning occuring again.
• In 1928 treatment of kulaks worsened, and Urals-Siberian scheme was introduced. This consisted of encouraging villagers to reveal grain-hoarders and those showing bourgeoise tendencies in exchange for rewards.

Question 8

6 points

What consequences did the famine of 1932-4 have?

Answer 8

• Biggest famine of the period.
• Death penalty imposed for stealing grain.
• Peasants who ate their own seed grain shot alongside those sent to guard it.
• Discussion of grain crisis was banned; Stalin publically denied a food problem existed.
• Severe restrictions placed on those who wanted to move around looking for food.
• Animals were slaughtered in preferance to handing them over to the authorities.

Question 9

2 points

What effect did WWII have on food supplies?

Answer 9

• Policy towards collectivisation relaxed. The removal of restrictions on the size of private plots of land meant that food production rose.
• However, this was short lived and there was another famine in 1947.

Question 10

3 points

What was food availability like under Khrushchev?

Answer 10

• Pattern of poor harvests and food shortages continued.
• Despite Virgin Land Scheme and improvement to state pricing for agricultural produce, food still had to be imported.
• HOWEVER, no major famines during Khrushchev’s term.

Question 11

2 points

Was food better or worse under the communists than the Tsars?

Answer 11

• Worse. By the late 1930s the consumption of meat and fish had fallen by 80%.
• Some argue that strict adherance to policy of ‘socialised agriculture’ led to inefficiency and a situation where the demand for food in Russia always outstripped the ability of Russian peasants to farm it.

Question 12

3 points

What was rural work like under the Tsars?

Answer 12

• Peasants could control the pace at which they worked and how much they produced.
• Only restrictions came from Mir.
• To achieve a surplus, peasants worked most days of the week from dawn till dusk, under harsh conditions.

Question 13

2 points

What was rural work like under the Communists?

Answer 13

• Nature of rural work changed. Methods and quantity dictated by central government - collectivisation etc.
• Investment made in new agricultural technologies, e.g. tractors.