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KHRUSHCHEV'S ECONOMY - Coggle Diagram
KHRUSHCHEV'S ECONOMY
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Virgin Lands Scheme
- Khrushchev hoped to increase Soviet agricultural production by turning unfarmed lands in north Caucasus, Kazakhstan, Western Siberia into new farms
- launched Sept 1953, needed significant investment, so agricultural investment grew from under 3% a year -> 12.8% of Soviet budget 1954-1959. 1953--1964 led to significant increase in amount of farmed land in USSR
Successes
- initially VLS was extremely successful. Grain harvests, meat and milk production all rose significantly 1953-1958. Overall agricultural production increased by 35.3%
- scheme led to greater availability of food in Soviet shops and so better standard of living for Soviet citizens. Greater production -> 400% increase in income of farm workers.
successes of scheme allowed Khrushchev to consolidate his position and led him to advocate even more ambitious schemes
Failures
- VLS was expensive. Kazakhstan is naturally dry and thus farms needed sophisticated irrigation systems - expensive to run + maintain
- after initial success, VLS failed to lead to further growth
- Harvests in 1959 and 1960 slightly below 1958 levels
- 1960-1964 production slowly increased; overall agricultural production around 15% higher in '64 than '58. high figures but they were nothing compared to the targets Khrushchev had proposed in 1956 so failure
Corn Campaign
- September 1958 Khrushchev encouraged farmers in Ukraine to grow maize. Plan to shift wheat production to Virgin Lands farms while maize would be produced in traditional farms in Ukraine
- maize used to feed animals so increased meat for Soviet consumers
- Failure. Khrushchev's initiative was based on the success of US farms, but Soviet farms could only produce 50% corn per hectare that US farms managed- differences in climate, lower labour productivity, inferiority of Soviet tractors and fertilisers
- growing more corn meant Soviet farms produced less hay so amount of animal feed produced by Soviet farms decreased 30% 1958-1964
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