agricultural developments

Stolypins land reforms

• peasants become permanent owners of their land

• peasant owner should be able to develop it as he wished and without interference by the mir

• ending of redemption payments

• peasants allowed to leave mir restrictions and consolidate strips into 1 piece of land

• peasants allowed to leave villages entirely

• increase labour mobility- weaken internal passport system

• help given to those willing to settle in siberia

• greater financial assistance to buy land

khutor

where owner liven on the land with his own house separate from the village

otrub

where owner had land in one unit but lived in thr village with rights of access to communal pastures and woods

legislation: september 1906

more state and crown land is made available for peasants to buy government subsidies to encourage migration and settlement in siberia are increased

Legislation: october 1906

peasants are granted equal rights in their local administration

Legislation: november 1906

• peasants are given right to leave commune. collective ownership of land by a family is abolished

• peasant can withdraw land from commune and consolidate the scattered strips into one compact from

• a new peasants land bank is established to help peasants fund their own land ownership

Legislation: january 1907

• redemption payments are officially abolished

June 1910

all communes which had not redistributed land since 1861 are dissolved

economic: to establish independant household ownership

• by 1914: 2.5 million households (25%) had newly gained legal title to own land

• 4 million others declared owners

economic: to consolidate scattered stips into one holding

1916: 1.2 million households had set up consolidsated farms, enclosing 10% of allotment land

only 320,00 ofconsolidated holding were khutor farms

economic: to reduce power of mir and eventually disband it

• commune resiliant, peasants prefered collective welfare

• in most populated areas few left communes

• in 1917 revolution 95% returned to mir

economic: to improve efficiency of agriculture

• limited impact- sometimes reuined soil by exhaustive methods

• productivity only increased 1% per annum

• legal changes by themselves inadequate to greatly improve efficiency

economic: to encpurage land transfers,

1908-16: 1.1 million households sold farms

1906-14: 4 million desyatins, purchased via state banks from nobles

economic: to encourage migration to siberia

• 5 million migrated to siberia,mainly to set uo dair farms

• one sixth returned

poltical: to reorientate tsarism from declining gentry to new peasanty

freely elected first and second dumas dominated by radical peasant deputies wanting gentry land confiscation

electoral law had to be changed to give dominant influence to gentry

political: to divert peasant’s gaze from gentry lands to commune

after 1903-06: disturbances declined, but during 1917 revolution there was a peasant upsurge to seize gentry land in “second emancipation”

tension in countryside continued, now directed at resented separators

1914: nmber of farms separated from communal lands- unsuccessful

only 10% oh households set up farms separate from communal lands

agricultural machinery- successful

1914:largest cereal exporter in world

1891-1913: agricultural machinery rose at annual rateof 9%

livestock- unsuccessful

• over-concentration on grain production for export contributed to failure of livestock to keep pace with population increase

• while number of horses, pigs and sheep increased, number per capita fell

old methods still used - unsuccessful

• 20 million peasant households, most still in rural communes and used traditional methods of farming

• many used three-field stip system

ownership of land- successful

ownership of land by peasants increaed from 20%(1905) to 50%(1915)

grain production - successful

rose annually from 56 million tons (1900) to 90 million (1914)

1909: russia was worlds largest cerela exporter

kulak status- unsuccessful

• fewer than 1% achieved kulak status