Mikheev E. K., Nikulin A. M., Fadeeva O. P. “Our strategy was based on the principle of doing what was profitable” // The Russian Peasant Studies. 2024. V.9. №2. P. 212-234.

DOI: 10.22394/2500-1809-2024-9-2-212-234

Annotation

The interview with E. K. Mikheev (DSc (Economics and Management), Head of the agroholding Niva-Mikheev and Co, Honored Worker of Agriculture of the Russian Federation, Honorary Citizen of the Nizhny Novgorod Region and Buturlinsky district), which was conducted by sociologists A. M. Nikulin and O. P. Fadeeva in August 2023, reconstructs his life path from the peasant collective-farm family to the world of contemporary agricultural science, politics and business. The interviewers focused on the economic philosophy of Mikheev as agricultural manager, his decision-making logic at the collective farm in the USSR and in the post-Soviet period of the developing market economy in the 1990s, his estimates of the situation at his agroholding, agrarian economy and rural development in the Nizhny Novgorod Region and Russia. The interview emphasizes the rational choice of economic decisions made and implemented in the transforming national and local institutional environment. 

Keywords

Agroholding, collective farm, perestroika, Russia, USA, agricultural strategy, Nizhny Novgorod reforms, profit.

About the authors

Evgeny K. Mikheev, DSc (Economics and Management), Head of the Niva-Mikheev and Co agroholding. Ogorodnaya St., village Valgusy, Buturlinsky district, Nizhny Novgorod Region, 607451, Russia.
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Nikulin Alexander M., PhD (Economics), Head of the Center for Agrarian Studies, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration; ViceRector for Research, Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences, Vernadskogo Prosp., 82, Moscow, 119571, Russia.
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Fadeeva Olga P., PhD (Sociology), Head of the Department, Institute of Economics and Organization of Industrial Production, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Academician Lavrentiev Prosp., 17, Novosibirsk, 630090, Russia.
E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. 

The article was submitted on 25.01.2024.

Filev M. V. How the reforms of Malenkov and Khrushchev changed the life of the collective farm Bolshevik: A microhistoric study // The Russian Peasant Studies. 2022. V.7. №2. P. 68-92.

DOI: 10.22394/2500-1809-2022-7-2-68-92

Annotation

In historiography, agricultural transformations started by G. M. Malenkov and N. S. Khrushchev are usually considered as having improved the situation of the peasantry and the level of production. The author assesses the effectiveness of these reforms with a microhistorical approach based on the study of the collective farm Bolshevik in the Pravdinsky district of the Kaliningrad Region — as typical for the region and the country. The research is based on the archives of this kolkhoz: collective farmers’, communist party members’ and managers’ meetings, annual reports, documents of the regional agricultural authorities. The article describes the main changes in the structure of agricultural production: reorganization of labor brigades, daily routines and machine-tractor stations, consolidation of the collective farm, etc. The author examines the state policy regarding personal subsidiary economies of collective farmers: on the one hand, there were new restrictions, on the other hand, resources of peasant economies improved the statistical indicators of the kolkhoz. The article focuses on administrative and economic ways for motivating peasants to work in the collective farm and shows their inconsistency in terms of increasing labor productivity. Annual statistical reports of the collective farm on animal husbandry and crop production show no sustainable growth of any indicators and only modest progress due to the extensive methods of development and exploitation of the collective farmers’ personal subsidiary economies. The author emphasizes the absence of any significant results from the 1950s reforms which did not affect the roots of the collective-farm system inefficiency.

Keywords

Agrarian reforms, microhistory, Kaliningrad Region, collective farm, machine-tractor station, personal subsidiary economies, G. M. Malenkov, N. S. Khrushchev.

About the author

Filev Maksim V., PhD Student, Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University. 236041, Kaliningrad, Alexander Nevsky St., 14.
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