Yet
the Government has failed badly in this respect. The rations are
inadequate and irregular, so that it is impossible to preserve health
and vigour without the help of food purchased illicitly in the markets
at speculative prices. I have given reasons for thinking that the
breakdown of transport, though a contributory cause, is not the main
reason for the shortage. The main reason is the hostility of the
peasants, which, in turn, is due to the collapse of industry and to
the policy of forced requisitions. In regard to corn and flour, the
Government requisitions all that the peasant produces above a certain
minimum required for himself and his family. If, instead, it exacted a
fixed amount as rent, it would not destroy his incentive to
production, and would not provide nearly such a strong motive for
concealment. But this plan would have enabled the peasants to grow
rich, and would have involved a confessed abandonment of Communist
theory. It has therefore been thought better to employ forcible
methods, which led to disaster, as they were bound to do.
The collapse of industry was the chief cause of the food difficulties,
and has in turn been aggravated by them. Owing to the fact that there
is abundant food in the country, industrial and urban workers are
perpetually attempting to abandon their employment for agriculture.
This is illegal, and is severely punished, by imprisonment or convict
labour. Nevertheless it continues, and in so vast a country as Russia
it is not possible to prevent it.
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