The Land

Like other natural resources in the Soviet Union, agricultural land suffered heavily from the extensive nature of its exploitation. 

Many problems can be traced to the Virgin Lands Programme instituted in the 1953 by Nikita Khrushchev. Not many people know what Nikita Khrushchev’s wife has died young from starvation in the terrible famine in 1921, which might have left a lifelong concern for food and agriculture in his mind over his career at communist party. 

Virgin Land postcard

Dissatisfied with the low yields on existing farmland, Khrushchev initiated a drive to open up vast new tracts of land in order to alleviate the food shortages plaguing the Soviet populace. 

These «virgin lands» (northern Kazakhstan and western Siberia) were put under the plough at an unparalleled intensity and scale. By the end of 1954, 17.6 million ha had been converted to croplands; a total of 30 million was reached by the end of 1955, of which 20 million were cultivated.

During it first two years, the Virgin Lands Programme recorded with positive and negative impacts. Grain productivity sharply increased, but soil degradation processes, especially wind erosion on the sandy lands, cleared of their natural vegetation. Most of the virgin lands were grassland of marginal quality and not allowed to lie fallow for long periods.

Though the program was abandoned, as it hasn't proved to be very sustainable, these marginal lands continued to be cropped continuously as farmers were under constant pressure to boost output. As a result, an average of 30–50 percent of the humus was lost, turning parts of southern Siberia and northern Kazakhstan into a virtual dust bowl.