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

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268<br />

V. I. LENIN<br />

add here that the analysis <strong>of</strong> the Zemstvo statistics on this<br />

question made by Mr. Raspopin* fully confirms this conclusion.<br />

We refer the reader <strong>to</strong> Mr. Raspopin’s article for<br />

detailed data and give here only his main conclusion. “The<br />

interdependence <strong>of</strong> the condition <strong>of</strong> s<strong>to</strong>ck raising and dairy<br />

farming, on the one hand, and the number <strong>of</strong> dilapidated<br />

estates and the intensity <strong>of</strong> farming, on the other, is beyond<br />

question. The uyezds (<strong>of</strong> Moscow Gubernia) where dairy<br />

cattle raising, dairy farming, is most developed show the<br />

smallest percentage <strong>of</strong> dilapidated farms and the highest<br />

percentage <strong>of</strong> estates with highly developed field cultivation.<br />

Throughout Moscow Gubernia ploughland is being<br />

reduced and turned in<strong>to</strong> meadow and pastureland, while<br />

grain rotations are yielding place <strong>to</strong> multi-field herbage<br />

rotations. Fodder grasses and dairy cattle, and not grain,<br />

are now predominant . . . not only on the farming estates in<br />

Moscow Gubernia but throughout the Moscow industrial<br />

district” (loc. cit.).<br />

The scale <strong>of</strong> butter production and cheese making is<br />

particularly important precisely because it testifies <strong>to</strong> a complete<br />

revolution in agriculture, which becomes entrepreneur<br />

farming and breaks with routine. Capitalism subordinates<br />

<strong>to</strong> itself one <strong>of</strong> the products <strong>of</strong> agriculture, and all<br />

other aspects <strong>of</strong> farming are fitted in with this principal<br />

product. The keeping <strong>of</strong> dairy cattle calls forth the cultivation<br />

<strong>of</strong> grasses, the change-over from the three-field system<br />

<strong>to</strong> multi-field systems, etc. The waste products <strong>of</strong> cheese<br />

making go <strong>to</strong> fatten cattle for the market. Not only milk<br />

processing, but the whole <strong>of</strong> agriculture becomes a commercial<br />

enterprise.** The influence <strong>of</strong> cheese production and<br />

* This problem also has been raised by Mr. Raspopin (perhaps<br />

for the first time in our literature) from the correct, theoretically<br />

sound point <strong>of</strong> view. At the very outset he observes that “the enhancement<br />

<strong>of</strong> the productivity <strong>of</strong> s<strong>to</strong>ck farming—in particular, the<br />

development <strong>of</strong> dairy farming—is proceeding in this country along<br />

capitalist lines and serves as one <strong>of</strong> the most important indices <strong>of</strong> the<br />

penetration <strong>of</strong> capital in<strong>to</strong> agriculture.<br />

** Dr. Zhbankov says in his Sanitary Investigation <strong>of</strong> Fac<strong>to</strong>ries<br />

and <strong>Works</strong> <strong>of</strong> Smolensk Gubernia (Smolensk, 1894, <strong>Vol</strong>. I, p. 7) that<br />

“the number <strong>of</strong> workers engaged in cheese making proper ... is very<br />

inconsiderable.... There are far more auxiliary workers, needed both<br />

for cheese making and for agriculture; these are herdsmen, milkmaids,

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