Izvorni znanstveni članak
PART-TIME FARMERS IN POLAND
Dyzma Galaj
Sažetak
^,he^e is a considerable number of private smallholdings in Poland where
individual members of the family are employed outside the farm while at the
same time continuing to do some farm work. This combination of two activities
will remain m Existence until the farms can ensure for the families living on them
a socially acceptable standard of living or until ways are opened for the transition
of these inhabitants into non-agricultural activities. According to the 1970 census, 35% of the active population and 30% of the
heads of rural families in Poland were permanently employed outside agriculture.
The income earned by them in jobs outside agriculture exceeded the total accumulation
of peasant smallholdings.
The author distinguishes three main groups of part-time farmers:
(a) peasants/workers with farms chiefly exceeding 2 hectares in area,
(b) workers/peasants with farms between 0.5 and 2 hectares,
(c) workers with garden plots who mainly live from income earned in non-
-agricultural activities.
Gradually most of the part-time farmers base their subsistence on a non-agricultural
activity while their farms turn into garden plots.
As regards the effect af this part-time agriculture on the country’s agricultural
production the author states that part-time farms with up to 2 hectares
of land have a higher average output per hectare than have purely agricultural
ones; that medium-sized farms of both categories have approximately the same
output per hectare; and that on larger smallholdings productivity ih higher in the
case of purely agricultural households.
The development of socialist relations and the transformation of the Polish
society as a whole have led to the formation of a comparatively peasant class, a
decline of smallbourgeois tendencies among the peasantry, and an increase in the
number of workers/peasants which tends to strengthen the federation of workers
and peasants.
Peasants/workers live on the periphery of the traditional rural and urban
cultures, with elements of urban culture growing and those of rural culture weakening.
Peasants/workers have a much easier access to the achievements of urban
civilization than have peasants, and they are more inclined to accept the values
of urban life than are peasants. However, part-time agriculture also has adverse
effects on the social development of rural areas: the old rural culture is disappearing
at a faster rate than is urban culture spreading. Moreover, it is usually the
less valuable elements of mass culture which spread to the rural areas at the
expense of the more valuable folk culture. This results in an unwanted cultural
disequilibrium which must be overcome.
In the view of the author the problem of peasants/workers can be solved
gradually by making possible their full transition into non-agricultural jobs. This
transition of peasants/workers into non-agricultural activities ought to proceed
as part of an integral plan for the spatial organization of the country, i. e. through
the development of a planned network of rural and urban settlements.
In the concluding part of his article the author discusses in greater detail
various measures for solving the problem of peasants/workers along these lines.
Ključne riječi
Hrčak ID:
118959
URI
Datum izdavanja:
10.12.1974.
Posjeta: 881 *