Round table of the Russian Peasant Studies for the 100th anniversary of Professor Viktor Petrovich Danilov // The Russian Peasant Studies. 2025. V.10. №3. P. 153-181.

EDN: JQSTCB

Annotation

On March 25, 2025, a round table of the Russian Peasant Studies for the 100th anniversary of the outstanding agricultural historian, Professor Viktor Petrovich Danilov (1925–2004), was held. The participants noted the contribution of V. P. Danilov to the Russian and world historiography, shared personal memories of him and work with him, and discussed current issues of agricultural and social history. The following participants made presentations: Alexander V. Zhuravel, Historian, Independent Researcher; Viktor V. Kondrashin, DSc (History), Professor, Chief Researcher, Head of the Center for Economic History of the Institute of Russian History, RAS; Igor A. Kuznetsov, PhD (History), Senior Researcher, Center for Economic and Social History, RANEPA; Alexander V. Gordon, DSc (History), Chief Researcher, Head of the East and Southeast Asia Sector, INION RAS; Elena A. Tyurina, PhD (History), Head of the Russian State Archive of Economics; Igor N. Slepnev, PhD (History), Senior Researcher, Center for Economic History of the Institute of Russian History, RAS; Elena V. Danilova; Vladislav O. Afanasenkov, Junior Researcher, Center for Economic and Social History, RANEPA. The discussion was moderated by Alexander M. Nikulin, PhD (Economics), Editor-in-Chief of the Russian Peasant Studies, Head of the Center for Agrarian Studies, RANEPA. 

Keywords

Round table, outstanding agricultural historian, Viktor Petrovich Danilov, Russian and world historiography, shared personal memories, current issues of agricultural and social history.

About the authors

Alexander V. Zhuravel, Historian, Independent Researcher. Profsoyuzov St. 1, Bryansk, 241022, Russia.
Viktor V. Kondrashin, DSc (History), Chief Researcher, Head of the Center for Economic History, Institute of Russian History, Russian Academy of Sciences. Dmitry Ulyanov St., 19, Moscow, 117292, Russia.
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Igor A. Kuznetsov, PhD (History), Senior Researcher at the Center for Economic and Social History, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration. Vernadskogo Prosp., 82, building 1, Moscow, 119571, Russia.
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Alexander V. Gordon, DSc (History), Chief Researcher, Head of the East and Southeast Asia Sector, Institute of Scientific Information for Social Sciences, Russian Academy of Sciences. Nakhimovsky prosp., 51/21, Moscow, 117418, Russia.
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Elena A. Tyurina, PhD (History), Scientific Director of the Russian State Archive of Economics. B. Pirogovskaya St., 17, Moscow, 119435, Russia.
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Igor N. Slepnev, PhD (History), Senior Researcher of the Center for Economic History, Institute of Russian History, Russian Academy of Sciences. Dmitry Ulyanov St., 19, Moscow, 117292, Russia.
Elena V. Danilova, independent researcher. Boris Galushkin St., 17, Moscow, 129301, Russia.
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Vladislav O. Afanasenkov, Junior Researcher at the Center for Economic and Social History, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration. Vernadskogo Prosp., 82, building 1, Moscow, 119571, Russia.
E-mail: erpaison@ gmail.com
Alexander M. Nikulin, PhD (Economics), Head of the Center for Agrarian Studies, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration. Vernadskogo Prosp., 82, bldg. 1, Moscow, 119571, Russia.
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Afanasenkov V.O. Pre-revolutionary official statistics of animal husbandry: The state of historiography and research prospects // The Russian Peasant Studies. 2025. V.10. №2. P. 63-82.

EDN: ALCYDM

Annotation

The article considers research approaches, hypotheses and assessments of the pre-revolutionary livestock statistics as presented in historiography. At the early stage, the expert community mainly believed in the low reliability of such data, although admitted its suitability for the study of livestock population dynamics and geographical distribution. The retrospective scientific analysis started with A. L. Vainshtein’s article (1960) comparing annual statistics with the 1916 agricultural census. Vainshtein proposed a method for adjusting annual data and upward corrections and questioned the comparability of the Veterinary Department statistics before and after 1896 and the consistency of data of the Central Statistical Committee and the Veterinary Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. The most recent stage of historiography was marked by the debate between “optimists” and “pessimists” in the 2000s. The most reasonable hypothesis was proposed by S. A. Nefedov — that the pre-revolutionary annual statistics fully accounted for adult livestock, while the 1916 census also counted young cattle. None of the historiographic research questions have been resolved, including the use of the livestock population data for identifying the volume of livestock production. The author suggests considering statistics as an element of the state system of governance.

Keywords

A. L. Vainshtein, agricultural census, agricultural history, Central Statistical Committee, provincial governors’ reports, Veterinary Department.

About the author

Vladislav O. Afanasenkov, Junior Researcher, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration. Vernadskogo Prosp., 82, Moscow, 119571, Russia.
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Brutskus B.D. Elimination of the world crisis (Article of B.D. Brutskus) // The Russian Peasant Studies. 2025. V.10. №1. P. 6-15.

EDN: AAOQLZ

Annotation

Boris Davidovich Brutskus (1874–1938) was a remarkable economist whose agrarian studies are usually attributed to A. V. Chayanov’s organization-production school. However, agrarian issues were only one aspect of Brutskus’s multifaceted intellectual heritage as a major specialist in Jewish migration and colonization in the late 19th — early 20th centuries, in the political-economic criticism of the Russian Revolution, Soviet economic system and socialism in general. He was an insightful expert not only in issues of the Russian and Soviet economic policy but also in international economic-political relations.
In his theoretical and ideological views Brutskus was a consistent supporter of liberalism but not an orthodox supporter of the homo economicus model. He spoke with deep respect and understanding about worldview values of socialism of both populist and Marxist directions, which were associated with the ideas of cooperative family economies and a socially oriented state, and emphasized that the market, free enterprise and economic freedom were fundamental conditions for any freedom in principle.
With the Bolsheviks coming to power, during the civil war, Brutskus consistently and convincingly criticized the Soviet economic policy, for which the United State Political Administration (OGPU) expelled him on the so-called philosophical steamship to Germany. In Europe, until the early 1930s, Brutskus lectured on agrarian issues and political economy at the Russian Scientific Institute in Berlin and taught at the Yiddish University in Vilnius. After the Nazis came to power, he moved to Paris, and in 1935 emigrated to Palestine, where he headed the Department of Agricultural Economics and Policy at the University of Jerusalem, which was established with funds from the Jewish National Fund and at which he conducted research and taught until his death in 1938. Brutskus “was very enthusiastic about not only teaching but also practical activities to promote Jewish agriculture”. Brutskus’s great contribution to the developing Jewish agricultural and economic science was recognized and highly praised: his course of lectures was published posthumously, and the national journalism called him a Jewish genius of our time.
Brutskus was an incredibly gifted and prolific economist and publicist, his analytical articles on the most current social-economic events of the 1920s and 1930s were published in newspapers and magazines not only in the Russian émigré press but also in national languages in periodicals of some European and North American countries. Thereby, it is not surprising that the article “Elimination of the world crisis”, which was discovered in B.D. Brutskus’s collection in the Central Archive for History of the Jewish People and which the author had prepared for publication but had not managed to publish, provides an overview of fundamental contradictions and probable alternatives for political-economic development of the world economy recovering with difficulty and in contradictory ways from the Great Depression in the second half of the 1930s.
In this article, Brutskus identifies those groups of countries and key sectors of the economy that overcame consequences of the world crisis in different ways. This multipolarity of political-economic development caused Brutskus concern mainly due to the strengthening tendencies of bureaucratic autarkization of economies in some countries preparing for war. At the end of the article, Brutskus prophetically warns that the implementation of the German slogan “guns instead of butter” under declining international movement of migrants, capital, goods and increasing political-economic polarization of countries leads to an escalation of international tension and future military-political conflicts.

Keywords

Crisis, market, capitalism, unemployment, agriculture, industry, League of Nations, economic policy.

About the authors

Boris D. Brutskus
Publishers: Alexander M. Nikulin, PhD (Economics),Head of the Chayanov Research Center, Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences.Gazetny per., 3-5, bl. 1, Moscow, 125009, Russia.
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Vladislav O. Afanasenkov, Junior Researcher, Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences; Gazetny per., 3-5, bl. 1, Moscow, 125009, Russia.
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Translator: Irina V. Trotsuk, DSc (Sociology), Professor, Sociology Chair, RUDN University; Senior Researcher, Center for Agrarian Studies, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration. 119571, Moscow, Vernadskogo Prosp, 82.
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Chayanov A.V. A short review of the centers of economic thought in the field of agriculture in Europe and other countries (based on the book exchange and scientific correspondence of the Institute of Agricultural Economics) (Article of A.V. Chayanov) // The Russian Peasant Studies. 2023. V.8. №4. P. 10-22.

DOI: 10.22394/2500-1809-2023-8-4-10-22

Annotation

In 2024, it will be 125 years since the establishment of the Higher Seminary of Agricultural Economics and Policy at the Petrovsky Agricultural Academy, which was later transformed into the famous Research Institute of Agricultural Economics (RIAE) headed in the 1920s by A. V. Chayanov. His article “A short review of the centers of economic thought in the field of agriculture in Europe and other countries”, published in the Bulletin of the Research Institute of Agricultural Economics in 1927, is presented for the English-speaking reader for the first time. Chayanov provides a brief description of the most important centers of the agrarian economic thought, including those with whom the Institute managed to establish correspondence and book exchange, and concludes the review with a conditional classification of trends in the science of organizing agricultural production in the 1920s. Certainly, this long list of scientific institutions and research partners was to prove the high importance and usefulness of the Institute for strengthening the prestige of the Soviet science and Soviet Russia in the international arena. However, fate decreed otherwise: in 1928, Chayanov was removed from the leadership position; in 1929, the Institute was reorganized and merged with the Institute of Large-Scale Economy into the Institute for Organizing Large-Scale Economy and Agricultural Economics; in 1930, after the final removal of Chayanov from the scientific staff, this new Institute was transformed into the Collective Farm Institute. Thus, all international contacts were cut off; Chayanov’s Institute, which united researchers with different approaches and views on the object and tasks of agricultural economics as a scientific discipline, was destroyed, and Chayanov’s materials on international relations, ironically, formed the basis for the future work scenario of the punitive authorities (as follows from Chayanov’s interrogations by the Chief of the Secret Department of the Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU) Ya.S. Agranov).
The English translation of the concept “agricultural economy” used by Chayanov for the field of scientific knowledge is still debatable. According to specialists in the history of economic thought and in Chayanov’s works, there are two options: agricultural economics and agricultural economy. It was suggested that the term “agricultural economy” would more accurately reflect the diversity of approaches in the Soviet agrarian-economic thought of the 1920s: general economic theory (applied to agriculture) in its interpretation by the world science of the 1920s; technical and technological (agronomic) approaches to organizing the economy; theory and practice of agricultural policy with an emphasis on its social aspect; accounting and taxation. We should not understand “economy” as anything else than a historical, outdated by the end of the 19th century synonym for economic science, which in the late 19th — early 20th centuries was abandoned in favor of “economics” all around the world, including in Russia (B.D. Brutskus, N.N. Kazhanov, A. I. Skvortsov, A. F. Fortunatov, etc.). Thus, in 1925, the title of the famous work by G. A. Studensky was translated by the publisher in English as Outlines of Agricultural Economics. In other words, “economics” is just the name of economic science and cannot be reduced to A. Marshall’s ideas; therefore, the term “economy” interferes with the correct understanding of Chayanov’s text by the English-speaking reader, providing wrong connotations with real economic phenomena — industry and economy.
The text is provided with notes that clarify and supplement facts mentioned by Chayanov. Editor’s notes are marked as Ed.

Keywords

A. V. Chayanov, Research Institute of Agricultural Economics (RIAE), centers of the agrarian economic thought, Soviet science, international contacts.

About the authors

Alexander V. Chayanov
Vladislav O. Afanasenkov (publisher), Senior Researcher, Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences; Junior Researcher, Research Centre for Economic and Social History, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration. Vernadskogo Prosp., 82, Moscow, 119571, Russia.
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Chayanov A. V. Organization of agricultural production at the local level (Article of A.V. Chayanov in English) // The Russian Peasant Studies. 2022. V.7. №3. P. 21-34.

DOI: 10.22394/2500-1809-2022-7-3-21-34

Annotation

This typescript was found in the fund of the Soviet party economist Lev Natanovich Kritzman (F. 528) in the Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences (ARAS), and has never been published before. The typescript consists of 16 sheets without an autograph or any handwritten corrections and marks. The typescript does not have any direct indications of the time of its creation. There are two more documents: a letter to Kritsman of December 26, 1929, and a fragment of the text written by Chayanov’s hand, which is very close to this typescript and seems to be one of its drafts. On the back of this sheet, there is an inscription — “2nd House of Soviets. Room 327. To L. N. Kritzman from A. Chayanov”.
The typescript presents the concept of the gradual ‘rooting’ of the peasant economy in socialism through the voluntary ‘cooperative collectivization’ and with the incentive mechanisms of a purely economic nature. We can see similar theoretical bases in Lenin’s ‘cooperative plan’ and Bukharin’s theory of the peaceful ingrowth of capitalist elements into socialism. In these ideological-theoretical alternatives to Stalin’s collectivization, the peasant was considered a full-fledged subject of the economic activity and socialist construction, who needed all possible assistance with the state policy measures rather than commands.
Chayanov refused to choose between the state-farm construction and the total socialization of the peasant agricultural sector. He developed an alternative program of socialist construction, which included the thorough revision of his own positions on some issues. Based on the data, Chayanov sought to show how far the Soviet village had moved from the pinnacle of the pre-war economic development, and that the Soviet peasantry had ceased to be ‘an object of the agronomic influence’. Thus, according to Chayanov, in contemporary realities, old methods and schemes of agronomic work became ineffective.
Archivists dated the documents in the file to 1930. We do not know reasons for such dating, but it raises some doubts. We can be certain about relative dating and the lower chronological frame — 1927. According to the address-reference book All Moscow, Kritzman moved to Room 327 of the 2nd House of Soviets in 1927 (All Moscow (1927) Address-Reference Book for 1927: 3rd year of publication by the Moscow Council; with the new plan for the city of Moscow, Moscow, p. 147).
There are more doubts about the upper chronological frame. If all these documents are really related to each other, the text should be dated according to the letter to Kritzman. Chayanov wrote that he had not finished an agronomic essay (in collaboration with P. Ya. Gurov and S.G. Uzhansky), because he was terribly upset by the first days of work of the First All-Union Conference of Marxist Agrarians. Moreover, Chayanov “did not get Sadyrin’s article, which made him throw away the whole ‘reality’ and end his ‘cooperation’ in the same purely theoretical terms as he had started” (ARAS. F. 528. Inv. 5. F. 137. L. 1). Chayanov could mean his articles for the Great Soviet Encyclopedia, in which Kritzman edited the section of economic sciences and the subsection of economic policy until 1931; or for one of the periodicals, in which Kritzman was a member of the editorial board (for instance, On the Agrarian Front). Chayanov could use the word ‘cooperation’ as a title for the typescript sent to Kritzman for proofreading and editing.
By the end of 1929, Chayanov was in an extremely difficult situation, and it became even worse after the First All-Union Conference of Marxist Agrarians, at which Chayanov and his colleagues were ideologically persecuted. Probably, after Stalin’s speech, Kritzman decided to postpone or abandon this publication. There is no article by Chayanov in the Great Soviet Encyclopedia, and no articles by Gurov or Uzhansky in the corresponding volumes; and this typescript was not published.
If our reasoning is correct, Chayanov’s courage can hardly be overestimated: under the huge ideological and psychological pressure, he decided to publicly announce his disagreement with Stalin’s course.
Editor’s notes are marked as Ed. and given in square brackets.

Keywords

Chayanov, collectivization, peasantry, state, social agronomy, socialism.

About the authors

Alexander V. Chayanov
Vladislav O. Afanasenkov (publisher), Senior Researcher, Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences; Junior Researcher, Research Centre for Economic and Social History, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration. Vernadskogo Prosp., 82, Moscow, 119571, Russia.
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Irina V. Trotsuk (translator), DSc (Sociology), Professor, Sociology Chair, RUDN University; Senior Researcher, Center for Agrarian Studies, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration. 119571, Moscow, Vernadskogo Prosp, 82.
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Chayanov A. V. Organization of agricultural production at the local level (Article of A.V. Chayanov in Russian) // The Russian Peasant Studies. 2022. V.7. №3. P. 6-20.

DOI: 10.22394/2500-1809-2022-7-3-6-20

Annotation

This typescript was found in the fund of the Soviet party economist Lev Natanovich Kritzman (F. 528) in the Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences (ARAS), and has never been published before. The typescript consists of 16 sheets without an autograph or any handwritten corrections and marks. The typescript does not have any direct indications of the time of its creation. There are two more documents: a letter to Kritsman of December 26, 1929, and a fragment of the text written by Chayanov’s hand, which is very close to this typescript and seems to be one of its drafts. On the back of this sheet, there is an inscription — “2nd House of Soviets. Room 327. To L. N. Kritzman from A. Chayanov”.
The typescript presents the concept of the gradual ‘rooting’ of the peasant economy in socialism through the voluntary ‘cooperative collectivization’ and with the incentive mechanisms of a purely economic nature. We can see similar theoretical bases in Lenin’s ‘cooperative plan’ and Bukharin’s theory of the peaceful ingrowth of capitalist elements into socialism. In these ideological-theoretical alternatives to Stalin’s collectivization, the peasant was considered a full-fledged subject of the economic activity and socialist construction, who needed all possible assistance with the state policy measures rather than commands.
Chayanov refused to choose between the state-farm construction and the total socialization of the peasant agricultural sector. He developed an alternative program of socialist construction, which included the thorough revision of his own positions on some issues. Based on the data, Chayanov sought to show how far the Soviet village had moved from the pinnacle of the pre-war economic development, and that the Soviet peasantry had ceased to be ‘an object of the agronomic influence’. Thus, according to Chayanov, in contemporary realities, old methods and schemes of agronomic work became ineffective.
Archivists dated the documents in the file to 1930. We do not know reasons for such dating, but it raises some doubts. We can be certain about relative dating and the lower chronological frame — 1927. According to the address-reference book All Moscow, Kritzman moved to Room 327 of the 2nd House of Soviets in 1927 (All Moscow (1927) Address-Reference Book for 1927: 3rd year of publication by the Moscow Council; with the new plan for the city of Moscow, Moscow, p. 147).
There are more doubts about the upper chronological frame. If all these documents are really related to each other, the text should be dated according to the letter to Kritzman. Chayanov wrote that he had not finished an agronomic essay (in collaboration with P. Ya. Gurov and S.G. Uzhansky), because he was terribly upset by the first days of work of the First All-Union Conference of Marxist Agrarians. Moreover, Chayanov “did not get Sadyrin’s article, which made him throw away the whole ‘reality’ and end his ‘cooperation’ in the same purely theoretical terms as he had started” (ARAS. F. 528. Inv. 5. F. 137. L. 1). Chayanov could mean his articles for the Great Soviet Encyclopedia, in which Kritzman edited the section of economic sciences and the subsection of economic policy until 1931; or for one of the periodicals, in which Kritzman was a member of the editorial board (for instance, On the Agrarian Front). Chayanov could use the word ‘cooperation’ as a title for the typescript sent to Kritzman for proofreading and editing.
By the end of 1929, Chayanov was in an extremely difficult situation, and it became even worse after the First All-Union Conference of Marxist Agrarians, at which Chayanov and his colleagues were ideologically persecuted. Probably, after Stalin’s speech, Kritzman decided to postpone or abandon this publication. There is no article by Chayanov in the Great Soviet Encyclopedia, and no articles by Gurov or Uzhansky in the corresponding volumes; and this typescript was not published.
If our reasoning is correct, Chayanov’s courage can hardly be overestimated: under the huge ideological and psychological pressure, he decided to publicly announce his disagreement with Stalin’s course.
Editor’s notes are marked as Ed. and given in square brackets.

Keywords

Chayanov, collectivization, peasantry, state, social agronomy, socialism.

About the authors

Alexander V. Chayanov
Vladislav O. Afanasenkov (publisher), Senior Researcher, Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences; Junior Researcher, Research Centre for Economic and Social History, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration. Vernadskogo Prosp., 82, Moscow, 119571, Russia.
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Sumida S. Rethinking Marx’s theory of the small-scale mode of production in the perspective of the small peasantry theory // The Russian Peasant Studies. 2022. V.7. №1. P. 29-51.

DOI: 10.22394/2500-1809-2022-7-1-29-51

Annotation

The translated article of the Japanese historian of social thought and Marxist Soichiro Sumida considers the understanding of the small-scale mode of production by Karl Marx. The author argues that the MEGA facilitates an objective interpretation of Marx’s works by excluding any impurities and distortions based on ideological convictions. Thus, Sumida analyzes and compares the traditional Japanese economic theories that developed under the influence of Marx and the texts of Marx to examine the concept of ‘small economy’. According to Sumida, by referring to the small peasantry in their works, previous generations of researchers erroneously studied the groups which Marx called ‘small farmers’. However, according to Marx, ‘small peasant’ and ‘small farmer’ are different categories.

Keywords

Karl Marx, peasantry, small economy, original accumulation.

About the authors

Sumida Soichiro, PhD (Sociology), Visiting Researcher, Carl von Ossietzky University of Oldenburg, Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities. Germany. D-10117 Berlin Jägerstrasse 22/23.
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Amgalan S. Sanzheev (translator), PhD Student, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies. 3-11-1, Asahi-cho, Fuchu-shi, Tokyo 183-8534, Japan.
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Vladislav O. Afanasenkov (editor), Researcher, Chayanov Research Center, Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences; Junior Researcher, Research Laboratory of Economic and Social History, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration. Vernadskogo Prosp., 82, Moscow, 119571, Russia.
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Afanasenkov V.O. Modernization of animal husbandry in the post-Stalin period: Contradictions and dilemmas of Khrushchev’s agrarian policy // The Russian Peasant Studies. 2021. V.6. №2. P. 166-171.

DOI: 10.22394/2500-1809-2021-6-2-166-171

About the author

Vladislav O. Afanasenkov, Junior Researcher, Research Laboratory of Economic and Social History, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration. Vernadskogo Prosp., 82, Moscow, 119571, Russia.
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Chayanov A.V. What will our national economy be like after the war? (Article of A.V. Chayanov) // The Russian Peasant Studies. 2021. V.6. №1. P. 6-12.

DOI: 10.22394/2500-1809-2021-6-1-6-12

Annotation

This article by A.V. Chayanov was published in the edition of the Moscow Union of Consumer Societies “Cooperative Rural Calendar for 1918” (Moscow, 1917, pp. 42–44). The article is of interest mainly as a short, impressive, journalistic, rapid forecast of the possible evolutionary directions of the Russian economy and society in the short-term and mid-term national-economic perspective. This is a polemical political-economic article due to Chayanov’s reflections on the interpretation of such concepts as ‘state socialism’ and ‘socialism’ in general, on the meaning of ‘public reason’ in the ongoing and future reforms, and also due to Chayanov’s forecasts of the Russian economic development as determined by such multidirectional economic, political and social factors as the state debt that had multiplied during the war, the weakening impact of inflation on the economy, and the after-war tasks of transferring the economy to a peaceful track. In his positive forecasts, Chayanov put special hopes on the awakening social and productive forces of the Russian peasantry. Chayanov believed that the growth of culture, labor productivity and cooperation among the peasantry would allow to find a way out of the impasse of the 1917 economic devastation. Although, as the later historical events showed, Chayanov’s belief in ‘public reason’ and the corresponding humanistic socialist prospects for Russia did not come true, he systematically identified the key dominants of both revolutionary and evolutionary transformations of the huge peasant country under the great social-political upheavals of the 20th century. 

Keywords

Agrarian reform, A.V. Chayanov, state socialism, cooperation, peasantry, public reason, World War I, revolution.

About the authors

Alexander V. Chayanov
Vladislav O. Afanasenkov, Researcher, Chayanov Research Center, Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences; Junior Researcher, Research Laboratory of Economic and Social History, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration. Vernadskogo Prosp., 82, Moscow, 119571, Russia.
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Afanasenkov V.O. Grain production in the provinces of Siberia (in the late 19th – early 20th centuries). On the relative indicators of yield statistics developed by the Central Statistical Committee of the Ministry of Internal Affairs // The Russian Peasant Studies. 2020. V.5. №3. P. 6-46.

DOI: 10.22394/2500-1809-2020-5-3-6-46

Annotation

The article considers the relative indicators of yield statistics developed by the Central Statistical Committee (CSC), based on the data from four Siberian provinces —Yenisei, Irkutsk, Tobolsk and Tomsk—for 1896–1913. The author analyzes food norms in the pre-revolutionary statistical literature and practice, and unifying coefficients for cereals, explains the need for such indicators, presents and examines the rows of per capita yields for each of the Siberian provinces. Based on the comparisons with the current statistics consisting of voluntary correspondents’ answers, the author questions the reliability of the CSC’s data. The article also considers the number of livestock in the Siberian provinces, possible methods and techniques for summing up the number of different types of livestock, and the fodder norms and sets presented in the literature. The author describes features of the production of basic feeds as recorded by the yield statistics of the CSC (potatoes, hay, straw, feed grain) and as calculated with the production indicators based on the CSC’s statistical data and expert estimates (cake, chaff). Yearly data on livestock and feed production is grouped into six-year periods, from which averages are calculated for comparison. The author provides several interpretations of the results related to the reliability of the CSC’s crop statistics and to the possibility of its use in further historical research.

Keywords

agrarian history, per capita yields, Siberia, statistics of animal husbandry, yields statistics

About the author

Vladislav O. Afanasenkov, Junior Researcher, Research Laboratory of Economic and Social History, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration. Vernadskogo Prosp., 82, Moscow, 119571, Russia.
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