New Economic Developments In Peasant Life - Part 4

Postnikov estimated that 16-18 dessiatines was the minimum required for subsistence. The poorer families had to hire out their members as wage labourers, whereas the more affluent families hired additional wage labour. In addition, the labour employed on larger farms, using more animals and implements, had much higher levels of productivity. This is illustrated in the following table.

Land Cultivatedn (Dessiatines)d	In the three uyezds of Taurida Gubernia
	Working persons			Average per household
	Hired	Released for hired	Difference	Number in family	Working persons
				(with hired labourers)
0 0 - 5 5 - 10 10 - 25 25 - 50 over 50	239 247 465 2,846 6,041 8,241	1,077 1,484 4,292 3,389 — —	- 838 -1,237 -3,827 - 543 +6,041 +8,241	4.3 4.8 5.2 6.8 8.9 13.3	0.9 1.0 1.0 1.6 2.4 5.0
Total	18,079	10,242	+7,837	—	—

Lenin notes that Postnikov was premature in concluding that all this spelled the extinction of the small producers. 

“... it is not enough to demonstrate the greater advantage of the latter (the lower price of the product); the predominance of money (more precisely, commodity) economy over natural economy must also be established; under natural economy, when the product is consumed by the producer himself and is not sent to the market, the cheap product does not encounter the more costly product on the market, and is therefore unable to oust it.” (p 37) 

The point, therefore, was the extent to which production was becoming commodity production. 

““The territory of every farm that is an independent unit,” says Postnikov, “consists of the following four parts: one part produces food for the sustenance of the working family and of the labourers who live on the farm; this, in the narrow sense, is the food area of the farm. Another part provides fodder for the cattle working on the farm, and may be called the fodder area. A third part consists of the farm yard, roads, ponds, etc., and of that part of the crop area that produces seed; it may be called the farm-service area, as it serves the needs of the whole farm without distinction. Lastly, the fourth part produces grain and plants destined, either raw or processed, for sale on the market; this is the market or commercial area of the farm. The division of the territory into these four parts is determined in each separate farm, not by the crops grown, but by the immediate purpose of their cultivation.”” (p 37-8) 

The larger the proportion of the territory given over to production for the market, the more the production is commodity production. Moreover, the more this proportion grows, the more agricultural production is dependent on the growth of the market, which necessarily means also the greater the number of people that can be employed in non-agricultural production, which is exchanged with the countryside.

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