243 



Van Atta 9 



which are now almost deserted. Competition from private farms will force the 

 collective and state farms to be more efficient. 



As the reform mechanisms have begun to operate, the Ministry of 

 Agriculture has found itself caught in a kind of self-destroying position. The 

 fvlinistry was established and organized to run agriculture from the capital. 

 Although the Minister. Viktor Khiystun. is a convinced reformer, most of his 

 subordinates, including his deputy and first deputy ministers (who are 

 appointed by the Russian prime minister, not the Minister himselQ are 

 professional agricultural administrators who have spent their entire careers in 

 the old system and oppose change. Moreover. Khiystun had few levers for 

 change beyond sending orders for change to the localities, where, as one farm 

 chairman recently told me; 'the district authorities called us together and said 

 we had a month to reorganize. Do it or else." 



As maricet mechanisms begin to operate, however, the Ministry's control 

 over agriculture has declined. Economic turmoil, problems in getting allocated 

 funds from the Central Bank and Ministry of Finance, and the general 

 breakdown of the old state-enforced economic system have made the Ministry's 

 activity increasingly irrelevant for the people on the land. 



Central authority to carry out the agrarian reform, and the definition of the 

 reforms themselves, were further confused during 1992 by conflict between 

 President Yeltsin and his Vice President. Afghan war hero AlexandetRutskoi. In 

 late February 1992. Yeltsin issued a directive giving Rutskoi personal 

 responsibility for carrying out the agrarian reform as well as converting defense 

 industry plants and resources to agricultural ends.s Since Y eltsin had eariier 



5 "Ukaz Prezidenta Rossiiskoi Federatsii: O porucheniiakh i 

 polnomochiiakh vitse-prezidenta Rossiiskoi Federatsii •Rossiiskievesti. No. 9 

 (March 5. 1992). p. 4. 



