p Comrades,

p We turn today to the history of collective-farm organisation not only to pay due tribute to the heroic past. It is also useful to recall it for the benefit of the future. Our Soviet people are building the material and technical basis of communist society.

p The all-round development of our country’s agriculture is of tremendous significance in achieving this great task.

p We have the necessary objective conditions for the successful advance of agriculture—vast tracts of land, big socialist agricultural enterprises as represented by the collective farms and state farms, a powerful industry, advanced science, competent and tried and tested cadres, and, lastly, the millions of splendid workers of agriculture.

p You know that the 23rd CPSU Congress, the March, May and October plenary meetings of the Central Committee defined the main lines of our policy and concrete tasks in agriculture at the present stage. Our aim is to have the policy of the Party correctly combine the interests of the state, of our entire society, with the interests of the collective farms and the collective farmers.

p What are the main lines of this policy? Put in a nutshell, they are above all the further strengthening and improvement of the machine and technical basis, large-scale land melioration and chemisation of agriculture. The new system of planning state purchases of agricultural produce and the economic stimulation of agricultural production are an important feature of this policy.

p The task is consistently to apply the programme for the development of agriculture drawn up by the Party. We must judge the results of our work by practical deeds. We must be strict and objective in assessing our own activities, we must not overpraise or magnify our achievements, but neither must we keep silent about them. The main thing is to see our shortcomings, not to neglect them and to rectify them in good time, to make adjustments in our plans, in our work. Life does not stand still, it constantly brings up new problems.

p Comrades, in carrying out the decisions of the 23rd Congress and the plenary meetings of the CPSU Central Committee, the collective-farm peasantry, state-farm workers, 237 agricultural specialists and Party, administrative and land bodies have made considerable efforts during these years to increase agricultural production. It should be noted that all the Union Republics, regions and territories have achieved positive results in the development of crop and animal husbandry.

p Permit me, comrade delegates, to give you some figures concerning fulfilment of the decisions on agriculture adopted by the Congress and plenary meetings of the Central Committee.

p The average annual overall output of agriculture between 1965 and 1968 increased by 18 per cent as compared with the preceding four years; that of grain by 15 per cent; meat 20 per cent; milk 24 per cent; raw cotton 22 per cent; sugar beet 47 per cent, and sunflower seed by 25 per cent. I have named only the staples.

p The advance in agriculture is to a considerable extent due to the rise in labour productivity. State purchases of farm produce also increased. The growth rates of production and purchases during that period were higher than in the preceding years.

p All this tended to raise the level of food consumption by the population. Specifically, per capita meat consumption will increase by 8 kg in 1969 as compared with 1964, milk by 50 kg and eggs by 36.

p This year, as you know, has been a difficult one for agriculture. Many districts were badly hit by the elemental forces of nature. But this year, too, production and state purchases of agricultural staples will be roughly on a level with the average annual volume over the last four years.

p Capital investments in agriculture were substantially increased, although for various reasons some of our plans fell short of accomplishment in this respect. During the period 1965 to 1968 capital investments by the state and the collective farms were 19,000 million rubles more than in the preceding four years.

p Important changes have taken place in recent years in the economics of the collective farms, in the life of the collective farmers; today the collective farms are big agricultural enterprises equipped with modern machinery and possessing skilled personnel. Today a collective farm has on the average more than 50 tractors, dozens of lorries, combines, electric motors and a good deal of other equipment. In 1935, when 238 the Second USSR Congress of Collective Farmers was held, the fixed assets of the collective farms were estimated at about 5,000 million rubles, while last year they already exceeded 40,000 million rubles (in comparable prices), being an eightfold increase.

p The introduction of stable plans and better adjusted purchasing prices on collective-farm produce acted as a powerful stimulus to the development of production and the strengthening of the collective farms. In recent years the incomes of the collective farms and remuneration of their members increased by 50 per cent. The village became more active in organising public services and amenities. In the last four years expenditure by the collective farms alone for these purposes almost doubled.

p Economic progress and better social conditions in the village are attended by an advance in culture. The Soviet peasant is an educated man. More than one-third of the collective farmers have a higher or secondary education. This, comrades, is one of our greatest victories. It gives me pleasure to inform you that, according to registration data, almost half of the delegates to the present Congress of Collective Farmers have a higher or secondary education. (Applause.} Many farmers working in the fields and the farms’ livestock sections are simultaneously studying in higher educational establishments, technical or secondary schools. Rural working people now subscribe to over 100 million copies of newspapers and magazines. This too is a great victory.

p The wide introduction of science and technology in agriculture is changing the pattern of the farmers’ work and helping to improve their skills. Today the collective farms have over two million machine operators and about 330,000 specialists with a higher or secondary education.

p Machine operators, livestock workers and other collective farmers are as a rule people who know their business, who are assimilating technology and science and, together with the specialists, are introducing modern production efficiency in the countryside.

p Thus, the material, technical and socio-economic prerequisites have been created for the further advance of agricultural production and the fuller satisfaction of people’s needs.

But you understand, comrades, that such big problems as overall mechanisation, the extended use of chemicals, 239 largescale land melioration and other such problems cannot be solved in three or four years. This will require both time and definite material resources, as well as preparation of the necessary production facilities and the training of skilled personnel.