CO-OPERATIVE MOVEMENT DURING THE WAR 1 9 



The activity of the Central Union as regards the fish trade deserves 

 special attention. In 1917 it bought two large refrigerators, a steamer and 

 ten barges which it had built on purpose for the transport of fish, thus pre- 

 paring for the sale of 250,000 puds of fish emanating from European Russia. 

 It also organized the purchase in Siberia. 



What is even more interesting is the great success which met the 

 union's effort to concentrate the trade in butter, cheese, eggs, pork, etc. 



§ 4. Co-operative Agriculture. 



On I January 1915 there were 1,768 agricultural co-operative institu- 

 tions. On I Januars'' 1916 their total number was 1883 and on i August 

 1916 it was 1981. Thus in one year it increased by 213 or 12 per cent. Most 

 of the new institutions, that is 91 out of the 138 formed in 1916, are collective 

 dairies. The slight development of agricultural as compared with other 

 co-operative institutions is entirely s^^mptomatic. In this branch of co- 

 operation an increase above the normal rate was provoked by the war as 

 elsewhere. On i Januar\^ 1914 there were 1316 of these institutions, and 

 on I August 1916 there were 1981 of them, so that the increase during the 

 war was of 665 or 50.6 per cent. In spite of their almost absolute lack of tech- 

 nical and financial aid, agricultural co-operative institutions have shown their 

 solidity and their great power of resistance to economic and social repercus- 

 sions. Their initiative has however been checked by their lack of means 

 of their own, which has constrained them to borrow a sum more than six 

 times the amount of their capital-shares and reserve fund. 



§ 5. Co-operative Buttermae:ing. 



The statistics of co-operative buttermaking are among the most in- 

 complete. The most exact refer to eight provinces — Arkangelsk, Vologda, 

 Viatka, Kostroma, Novgorod, Olenetzk, Perm and Jaroslav — and give the 

 following data as to the development of co-operative butter-factories : 



Table VIII. — Numerical Increase of Co-operative Butter Factories in Eight 

 Provinces from 1914 to 1916. 



Year 



Co-operative institutions in general 

 Co-operative butter-factories . . . 



As to co-operative butter-factories in Siberia we have the following 

 data. In the province of Tomsk there were 114 of them in 1914, 497 in 1915 

 and 1038 in 1916 ; in the province of Tobolsk there were 1200 of them in 



