molt Jagger 4' W- AIR POUCH I CONFIDENTIAL no IN THIS sauce 1 I Security Cid i ca on DESPATCH I FROM 51 f I a I user n5 - seat T0 wife It a I 3% I It REF Mamie 5h JP 2 955 E 3 nesse-hen rat Alim l t For-cpl meta gm - v or Um on Recs 0 3 6-7 6097 ewe-re ma Power-J semen How one Peasant is Meetin' A s 1F1n l a A peasant from the Viri ftg of we_ in inanevlvenie was in I Bucharest last week to bug 1 0 aha-at he said that he needed it to satisfy Lia oilettic on as horralip he would have bought the wheat in Merlin case he would mi all meet quotes with his own gro nctiov tr tbt gear there is none to he had since the whole distri ad a crop In the Bucharest peasant market the 1easenz will e able to get hds'wheat for 3 00 lg per kilo This run-ans a for of 3012-41-0 m plus third class train fare both time amount-1 15 to about 60 011 lei 360 00 lei in all When he serremnare the wheat he should receive about 28 00 lei for the delivery at 0 55 lgp er ailegram See Despatch August 31 195 711 1 of this he will have to pay for transportation of the wLeet to the receiving base his will leave about 20 lgi for him $19 total cost or the transac- tion to him will so about 314 0 u ease-SI The peasant feels that he will be able to hold on to his land - this year but is afraid that if next year's harvest is bad he will have to give up and join acollective or association He reports that his mother a widow with a tiny farms is giving up the strug- gle this year and joining a collective The pressure of agricul- tural taihs coming on top of quotes she could not meet was too much for her A local contact living in Bucharest reports that amateur who delivers milk to her from his small farm outside Bucharest has asked her to pay her milk bill in advance this month because the agricultural tax is coming due and he needs an unusually large amount of money to pay it COMMENT The ridiculousness of a system which compels the purchase and delivery of small amounts of grain from on of the coun- try to another merely to be collected and stored perhaps brought back eventually to Bucharest where it was bought is El- most too monumental for comment It is an illustration of the way that gradual collectivization is carried on If the quotes CONFIDENTIAL I 57 REP FL ACTION co v DEPARTMENT OF STATE The action once mutt return this Dal-Imam record copy to 13m Illa 'wth an endorsement n1 action taken g so Page of gt CONFIDENTIAL 1'me Bat Cinni td on defeat the peasant the agricultural 331 15 there reaey to ever- I come his already weakened resistance mhe tax even causes i fi- culties for these rich peaean s she ean sell produce in Buehar- eat It is interesting to note the relationship between_be har- vests and further socialization Eh general seeializetion at least in Rumania t1 mean an unpramnetive agriculture Conversely poor the pressure on the peasants and speed up socialization Insofar as the regime Hunts seeial- ization it must want poor haryee el at least in the private neo- tor Except for brief erieie periods such an that marked by the re-issions of arrears in taxes eh linotee in 3eptemher 1953 the contradictory policies er try tr at the same time he h to socialize a-riculture Bn inerease produetien centinue ow the Gherge dl ireires a i Themes F Hester Second Secretary of Legation ihe Department is requested to send processed copies to the following Amhmbaesy onGen Muni ch PRU -Am on en Frankfurt PRU gill new CONFIDENTIAL