1. Samara Gubernia. Based on a report dated 6 January. Samara Gubernia is located in a ring of [grain-] consuming gubernias (Ulianovsk, Ufa, Saratov, Urals, and the Tatar Republic), as a result of which grain has been and is being sent to these gubernias in large shipments from the border raions of Samara Gubernia. The enormous price difference (up to 5–6 rubles per pood of flour) has created an incentive not only for private capitalists but also for the peasants themselves to cart flour hundreds of versts to sell it in those gubernias. Such an enormous movement of grain has disrupted the grain procurements of state procurement agents, to whom no one wanted to deliver grain at set prices.

In the internal market private capitalists, in exactly the same manner, have removed large consignments, paying up to two rubles a pood and forwarding the grain by rail to various locations. Numerous instances have been reported in which grain is bought up and milled into flour by peasants, mostly kulaks and the well-to-do (called “maklaki” [middlemen]), who travel around the villages, buy up small quantities of grain, grind 100–200 poods each at mills, and carry them out to city markets. According to rough estimates, in recent months private traders have removed 480,000 poods of grain from the market, primarily wheat.

Railroad food supply agents buy a pood or two of flour apiece and thereby cause a great disruption in the market.

At the same time the activities of private meat merchants are worth noting. During the procurement period they collected 330,000 poods of meat (private traders collected 5,400 tons, as against 14,000 tons in total procurements by state procurement agents under the 1927–28 [economic year] plan). At various locations there are large groups of private traders who have a far-flung network of agents (up to 70 people), and they ship meat off by the dozens of railroad cars. Their sales reach into the hundreds of thousands of rubles. The advantageous ratio between grain and meat prices creates an incentive for peasants to pour meat into the market instead of grain.

The fact that peasants have grain is indisputable, despite the poor harvest that occurred in a number of raions of gubernias. For example, in Yekaterinovka Raion there is a grain surplus of up to 100,000 poods, which is concentrated among the stronger segments of the peasantry and middle peasants. Certain peasants have grain reserves of as much as 2,000–3,200 poods. The kulak and well-to-do segments of the countryside are beginning to take on the mood of “squeezing the city,” which also manifests itself in the fact that these strata want to make use of our difficulties for the purposes of their own well-being. Typical talk by a well-to-do peasant in Voskresenskoe, Samara Uezd, with factory workers at a bazaar: “At the present time you workers aren't giving us peasants the necessary industrial goods and the basic necessities, and what is available you're not selling at prewar prices, so right now you won't get anything from us. We well know that you'll need grain in the spring anyway and then you will give us the price we ask.”

Besides these attitudes, there have been reports of increased discontent with the cities, mainly on the part of middle peasants, and charges that the government “depreciates peasants' labor.”

“Peasant grain is extremely cheap, and the workers' industrial goods are very expensive, and the government buys up all the grain on the cheap and sends it abroad, but doesn't give the peasants anything for this. If war comes, the other peasants and I will definitely fight, but then we're going to restore rule by peasants alone, so that peasants don't live this way, under the workers' oppression” (middle peasant Osmankin, Buguruslan Uezd).

“Peasants aren't taking their grain to the market, because they've been taught by last year's bitter experience, when all their grain was bought from them dirt cheap. Just like then, the state is not giving peasants any goods now, so the peasants will do all they can to delay the delivery of grain.”

Discontent with the situation has also been noted among certain poor peasants and individual handicraftsmen. Typical in this respect is the talk of a number of poor peasants in Buguruslan Uezd, the point of which boils down to the fact that: “Peasants are doing the right thing in not taking grain to the market. Soviet power is to blame for this, because in its ten-year existence it hasn't been able to put industry on a firm track.”

2. Kursk Gubernia. Based on a report dated 3 January. Through 20 December 1927 (the end of the second ten-day period of the month), 11,393,000 poods of grain products had been procured in Kursk Gubernia, which is 51.8 percent of the annual plan. This December, just as last month, the inflow of grain products to the market has been poor, mostly rye and oats, and this is attributable to a number of factors: on the one hand, the inadequate supply of the markets with industrial goods, and on the other, the peasantry is meeting its material needs with funds received from the sale of other agricultural products and with earnings received [from work] at the sugar mills. It should be noted, however, that an increase in grain procurements over the first ten-day period of December has been noted. For example, 336,000 poods of various grain products were procured in the third ten-day period of November, 417,000 poods in the first ten-day period of December, and 504,000 poods in the second ten-day period. To increase the pace of grain procurements, local organizations are taking all the necessary measures, in particular, industrial goods, mostly textile goods, are being sent to the grain-growing raions of the gubernia. The results of these measures should have an effect in the immediate future.

Because of the inadequate delivery of grain products to the market, private grain procurement agents have intensified their activities and are carrying out procurements at increased prices, thereby disrupting the market and complicating the work of plan-oriented state and cooperative procurement agents.

The following has been noted in the work of grain procurement organizations this December: (a) The Gostorg [State Trade Agency] procurement center in Rylsk is conducting procurements of vetch at a price of 86 kopeks per pood, whereas the established price of it is 80 kopeks per pood. This is being done in order to capture the greatest quantity of vetch and to prevent its shipment to the Khleboprodukt centers that operate there. (b) The Nizhnee Smorodino Agricultural Credit Association in Ponyri Volost, Kursk Uezd, for an undetermined reason, is procuring grain products at reduced prices—for example, rye at a price of 75 kopeks a pood, oats 66 kopeks a pood, millet 64 kopeks a pood, buckwheat 34 kopeks a pood, and hemp 1 ruble 15 kopeks a pood.

3. Tula Gubernia. Based on a report dated 4 January. Grain procurements around the gubernia are poor. The main reasons for the peasantry's meager delivery of grain to the market is the peasantry's relatively plentiful supply of money and the lack of industrial goods in the countryside. In this situation the pace of grain procurements in December continues to be very slow.

4. Ulianovsk Gubernia. Based on a report dated 2 January. Procurements around the gubernia are poor. For example, in November the procurement plan was fulfilled by 7.2 percent, and from 1 December through 21 December it was 4 percent fulfilled. We should list the following reasons for the poor supply of grain by the peasantry: (1) The dry weather that prevailed during the winter-crop planting season created a wait-and-see attitude among peasants. (2) The price reductions mandated by the Commissariat of Trade last September have had the most negative effect on the supply of grain. (3) The reduction of state obligations, the deferment of tax-payment deadlines, and so forth have made things substantially easier for producers and, to a considerable extent, have deprived them of an incentive to deliver grain to the market. (4) Economic factors that have caused a decrease in grain deliveries basically boil down to the following: in the months since the grain harvest there have been increased sales of secondary agricultural products and livestock products, which are the most profitable for peasants than [sic] the sale of their grain surpluses. The price of livestock, which has nearly doubled (in November 1926 a cow cost an average of 77 rubles, while this November it cost 120 rubles), the sturdier condition of the peasant economy, outside earnings, and higher prices for workers and cart deliveries naturally have not provided an incentive to increase grain deliveries.

Market prices for rye, which were stable last July and August and dropped by 6 kopeks a pood in September, already rose significantly in October. Rye prices at some markets reached 1 ruble 30 kopeks a pood (an increase of up to 60 kopeks over the July-August prices). Wheat prices, because of increased demand and a poor harvest, have also been rising steadily. At some markets wheat prices are as much as 1 ruble 38 kopeks higher than during the summer months.

There is an even wider gap between the prices for grain and for processed products. At present the average price for rye is 76 kopeks, whereas rye flour and sifted flour go as high as 1 ruble 80 kopeks a pood. This factor has also affected the delivery of grain by the peasantry. The peasantry, taking account of the profitability of selling its surpluses in processed form, is reducing the supply of rye and wheat to almost zero.

The lack of a grain reserve with room to maneuver, the poor implementation by the Commissariat of Trade and local procurement agents of the plan for internal gubernia supplies, and the fact that the gubernia has raions with poor harvests and grain-consuming raions and is adjacent to the Chuv[ash] Republic and Nizhny Novgorod Gubernia allow no opportunity to eliminate the existing price gap. The supply of cities and of workers' and grain-consuming raions with grain has been poor, and speculation in processed products by private traders and, in part, by lower-level cooperatives has been observed. The gubernia's distilling industry, which is inadequately supplied with raw material (grain), has systematically violated procurement prices. An enormous gap has opened up between procurement and set prices. There has been a tense international situation in recent months and the danger of war. All of the above-mentioned factors have resulted in a decline in supply by the peasantry.

The private merchant's role in the 1927 grain procurement campaign (in recent months) has been mainly to process grain, particularly common and hulled millet, where the private merchant, taking advantage of the enormous price gap between grain and processed products, has successfully and intensively developed his procurement operations.

The standard set by the Commissariat of Trade for commercial expenditures, overhead, and other outlays for 1927–28 [economic year] must not exceed 48 kopeks per centner. Khleboprodukt alone exceeded this maximum by 7 rubles 36 kopeks per centner.

5. Penza Gubernia. Based on a report dated 31 December 1927. The increased delivery of grain that was noted in August and September has dropped sharply since October. For example, in November the plan was fulfilled to a level of only 10.8 percent. And since the beginning of the campaign all procurement agents have procured 3,012,000 poods, or 17.7 percent of the yearly plan.

The main reasons that have affected the negative aspect of grain procurements are: (1) An acute shortage of industrial goods, particularly textile goods. (2) Low prices for grain compared with prices for industrial goods. (3) The unrestricted participation of private traders in grain procurements. (4) Increased talk among the peasantry about war, and in this connection the peasantry's tendency to hold on to grain surpluses. (5) Inadequate pressure exerted by tax and other [government] organizations. (6) Bad road conditions during October and November.

6. Stalingrad Gubernia. Based on a report dated 5 January. Despite favorable aspects regarding grain procurements and the good roads that have been established, the progress of the procurement campaign is still far from satisfactory. The total of all crops procured from the beginning of the campaign through 1 December 1927 was 42,537 tons, which is 39 percent of the overall plan.

The pace of procurements has especially slowed in recent [months]— November and December. A total of 11,460 tons of all crops were procured in September, 1,694 tons in October, and 3,235 tons in November. Numerical data for December are not yet complete, but it will yield a drop to 70 percent as compared with November.

The main reason for the poor delivery of grain products of late, as is noted throughout the gubernia, is the wide difference between prices for grain products and prices for secondary agricultural products, such as meat, pork, poultry, hay, and others. Intensive purchases of pork and cattle are under way in Ust-Medveditskaia Okrug. In Khoper Okrug, due to the operation of a cannery that consumes 50,000 poods of meat, plus the procurement of livestock for the external market, which increases the sale of livestock by the public and reduces the shipment of grain out of the gubernia [sic].

The second reason is the limited delivery to this point of industrial goods to grain procurement raions, particularly textile goods, as a result of which the public has been heard to utter such remarks as: “We aren't being given a chance to buy necessities, so we're going to sow less grain” (Ust-Medveditskaia and Khoper okrugs).

In late December Stalingrad Gubernia received three railroad cars loaded with textile goods that were specifically intended to stimulate grain procurements and were distributed by the gubernia internal trade administration among the cooperative organizations of grain procurement raions, with a warning that the goods be sold to peasants who have delivered grain to state and cooperative organizations. From the very outset this measure yielded a number of negative incidents. In the village [stanitsa] of Archadinskaia, Ust-Medveditskaia Okrug, after the above-mentioned measures were announced a crowd of peasants assembled in front of the consumers' cooperative and screamed abuse at the government: “The government doesn't know how to harass the people, so what it's thought of is not to give any goods at all for money. We've won the best result—there's nothing to buy with our money, and everybody says that Soviet money is reliable.” As a result of discontent, textile goods have been lying at the consumers' cooperative since 23 December without movement, since nobody is bringing in grain to exchange for them. In Khoper Okrug, this measure caused the following incident. On 31 December 1927, while a large crowd filled the store of the Smychka consumers' cooperative, cries rang out: “Get the sales clerks out from behind the counter and take the goods. All of this was bought with our money.” The poor are also discontented. They say: “With each passing day life gets worse. Soviet power changes its practices toward peasants with each passing day. First they said sign up with the cooperatives, they'll give out goods to members, and now they're giving out goods only for grain, but we delivered all of

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our grain back in the fall, when there were no textile goods, and now they're not giving any out.” Similar incidents can be observed in other raions of the gubernia as well.

On 27 December 1927, two proclamations with the slogan “Famine threatens the village!” were discovered in Nikolaevsk Uezd. The two proclamations are of a similar nature, they are handwritten and say that the public is forbidden to ship goods out of the village, people carrying any bundle are detained, but the mill dispatches grain in all directions. It's a trust, the proclamation says, it's allowed, yet people are starving. Cooperatives are being organized, private traders aren't wanted, but private traders are the ones who kept your village going, and so forth.

7. Siberian Krai. Based on a report dated 3 January. Total procurements of grain products in Siberia from the beginning of the campaign through 10 December 1927 amounted to 336,660 tons of various crops, which is 25.5 percent of the yearly plan and 39 percent of the calendar plan. Fulfillment of the calendar plan for procurements by individual procurement agents was as follows: Khleboprodukt, 41 percent; Sibkraisoiuz,

The Sibkraisoiuz (Siberian Krai Union of Agricultural Cooperatives) was established in September 1922 as a general center for agricultural credit for cooperatives in Siberia. In December 1922, it began to play an active role in the marketing of agricultural produce.

63 percent; Selskosoiuz [All-Russian Union of Agricultural Cooperatives],

The Sel'skosoiuz, or the All-Russian Union of Agricultural Cooperatives, was created by the Constituent Congress of Plenipotentiaries of Agricultural Cooperative Unions that took place in Moscow on 20–24 August 1921. According to its regulations, the Sel'skosoiuz worked on the unification of agricultural cooperatives for joint work in the organization of cooperatives. It also led work on agricultural improvements; the production of essential agricultural tools and machinery; the processing and distribution of agricultural products; and arrangements for agricultural credit, as well as other measures for raising agricultural labor productivity.

Its regulations defined the composition of the Sel'skosoiuz in the following way: “The All-Russian Union of Agricultural Cooperatives may have as its members: (a) all-Russian associations of agricultural trade and industry cooperatives and similar central associations in republics within the RSFSR; (b) oblast, krai, and gubernia unions within the territory of the RSFSR that unite agricultural and credit cooperatives producing or distributing agricultural products, as well as performing other transactions contributing to agriculture; and (c) those uezd and raion unions of the nature specified in item ‘b’ that are either not in any part members of a gubernia or oblast union, or, by nature of their activities, cannot be served by such a union” (RGAE, f. 4106, op. 2, d. 2, ll. 244–45). During the first period of its activities, until the separation of the all-Russian branch cooperative centers and the final shaping of distribution systems in agricultural cooperation, the Sel'skosoiuz was the central association that provided means of production as well as processing and sales of agricultural products for the domestic and foreign markets. After the Council of the Center for Agricultural Cooperatives had been formed in 1925, and following the creation of the All-Union Council of Collective Farms (Kolkhoztsentr), the Sel'skosoiuz actually became a specialized center for supplying the means of production for agricultural cooperatives. In 1927, the Sel'skosoiuz was renamed the All-Russian Union of Agricultural Cooperatives for the Provision of the Means of Production for the Peasant Economy. However, the Sel'skosoiuz activities in providing supplies faced resistance from state agencies. The creation of a state joint-stock supply agency, Traktorotsentr, curtailed the activities of the Sel'skosoiuz, and it ceased to exist in August 1929. The assets of the Sel'skosoiuz were taken over by Khlebotsentr.

76 percent; Sibtorg [Siberian Trade Administration], 50 percent; Maslozhirsindikat [Oil and Fat Syndicate], 74 percent; Meltrest [Mill Trust], 74 percent.

The chief reason for underfulfillment of the procurement plan is the inadequate supply of industrial goods. As a result of the overall growth of the economy, the purchasing power of the countryside is growing: from 168 million in 1925–26 [economic year] to 235 million rubles in 1927–28 [economic year] (according to control figures of the Siberian Planning Committee for 1927–28 [economic year]).

Whereas the procurement plan for 1927–28 [economic year] increased over 1926–27 [economic year], the delivery of goods declined significantly.

From the start of the campaign throughout the first quarter, there were increased sales by peasants of flax, skins, meat, and other agricultural products, which substantially exceeded 1926–27 [economic year]. As a result of the latter factor, as well as the lack of pressure to collect overdue loans that the public has in the form of money and in kind from Selkredit [Agricultural Credit Association], Gosselsklad [State Agricultural Warehouse], and Selskosoiuz, a certain cash glut has formed among the public that has a negative effect on procurements.