A STATE FARM IN THE DEPTHS OF THE NONCHERNOZEM ZONE

Traces changes in land use and population characteristics on a state farm in Kalinin Oblast under collectivization and farm consolidation after World War II. The author argues that past policy has damaged agriculture's environmental base, destabilized its demographic foundations, and disrupted normal modes of life in the countryside. He advocates the development primarily of individual and cooperative forms of land tenure for small villages in the Nonchernozem Zone as one means for restoring local and individual initiative, fostering rural traditions, and helping resolve the country's food problem. -from Journal summary