Russian local government during the war and the Union of Zemstvos

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Monograph

Identifikator:: 1794855874

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-179223

Document type:: Monograph

Author:: Polner, Tichon I. http://d-nb.info/gnd/172311195

Title:: Russian local government during the war and the Union of Zemstvos

Place of publication:: New Haven

Publisher:: Yale Univ. Press

Year of publication:: 1930

Scope:: XXV, 317 S.

Digitisation:: 2022

Collection:: Economics Books

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Chapter

Document type:: Monograph

Structure type:: Chapter

Title:: Chapter X. Participation of the Zemstvos in the work of supply

Collection:: Economics Books

178 THE ZEMSTVOS DURING THE WAR zemstvos and the rural communities which they represented, the problem of the rise in the cost of foodstuffs was naturally less acute; apon the whole, the peasantry during the War were accumulating an abundance of money. According to some calculations, the pro- hibition of liquor alone had yielded to the peasants a cash surplus of nearly 1,000,000,000 rubles a year. To this must be added the government separation allowances, which gave them 500,000,000 rubles in the first year of the War and something like 1,000,000,000 rubles in 1916. Furthermore, the peasants benefited by the higher grain prices, although it is true that in the north the peasants, even before the War, had not been producing sufficient grain for their swn needs and were obliged to make additional purchases. Yet it so happened that grain prices were mounting more rapidly in the north than in the south; for instance the price of wheat flour in December, 1915, was 2.63 rubles per pud in Kiev, and 3.48 rubles m Moscow. Under normal conditions the increased flow of money into the rural communities, coupled with the reduction in the rural popula- tion due to the calling of a large number of men to the army, would probably have afforded compensation for the increase in the grain prices even in the north. The difficulty, however, was in the distribu- tion of foodstuffs. Russia as a whole had, it is true, sufficient sup- plies of grain available, and, as regards the apprehension of a dis- astrous reduction in the cultivated area, it was soon found to have been exaggerated. Poor harvests in certain localities were offset by the fact that the mormal peace-time exports of grain to foreign countries had ceased with the outbreak of hostilities. Unfortunately, 'n order to transport the grain to the places where it was urgently required, “almost insurmountable difficulties,” as the Yaroslav pro- yincial zemstvo board put it in one of its reports, had to be over- come. Railway facilities for the transport of grain were inadequate aven in time of peace. Now, under war conditions, they had become completely disorganized and were able to satisfy only a very small proportion of the needs of the civilian population. Moreover, the numerous conflicting orders issued by government commissioners were interfering with regular traffic. No uniform plan was any- where in evidence. There were frequent changes among the officials in charge of the food supply organization and the local work was greatly complicated in consequence. Government officials were work-

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