Collected Works of V. I. Lenin - Vol. 3 - From Marx to Mao

THE DEVELOPMENT OF CAPITALISM IN RUSSIA
253
ture and Forestry in Russia, published for the Chicago
Exhibition, pp. 132 and 142). Further, in order to judge of the
trend of evolution in the 90s we take the data for the decade
1885-1894 (Productive Forces, I, 4). Lastly, the data for
1905 (Yearbook of Russia, 1906) are quite adequate for a judgement
of the present time. The 1905 harvest was only a little
lower than the average for the five years 1900-1904.
Let us compare all these data.*
Fifty gubernias of European Russia 93
Million chetverts
Sown
Net
Net
Sown Net
yield yield
per capita yield,
in chetverts, of
Period All crops,
i.e., cerealsPotatoes
Cere- Pota- All
plus potatoes
alstoescrops
1864-1866 61.4 72.2 152.8 6.9 17.0 2.21 0.27 2.48
1870-1879 69.8 75.6 211.3 8.7 30.4 2.59 0.43 3.02
1883-1887 81.7 80.3 255.2 10.8 36.2 2.68 0.44 3.12
1885-1894
(1900-1904)
86.3 92.6 265.2 16.5 44.3 2.57 0.50 3.07
-1905 107.8 103.5 396.5 24.9 93.9 2.81 0.87 3.68
Population
(both sexes,
millions)
We see from this that until the 1890s the post-Reform era
is characterised by an undoubted increase in the production
both of cereals and potatoes. The productivity of
agricultural labour rises: firstly, the size of the net yield
grows faster than that of the sown area (with occasional
exceptions); secondly, we must bear in mind that the proportion
of the population engaged in agricultural production
steadily diminished during this period owing to the
diversion of the population from agriculture to commerce and
industry, and also owing to the migration of peasants beyond
the bounds of European Russia.** What is particularly
* For the period 1883-1887 we have taken the population of 1885;
the increase is taken at 1.2%. The difference between the data of the
gubernatorial reports and those of the Department of Agriculture is,
as we know, inconsiderable. The figures for 1905 have been arrived
at by converting poods into chetverts (about six bushels each.—Ed.)
** Mr. N. —on is quite wrong when he asserts that “there are no
grounds whatever for assuming a decline in their number” (the number
of persons engaged in agricultural production), “quite the contrary”
(Sketches, 33, note). See Chapter VIII, §II.