Modernization of the enterprise and types of modernization. What is modernization? Economic calculation of capital investments when modernizing equipment
1. In the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug, the modernization of the Lokosovsky gas processing plant has been completed
Processing associated petroleum gas in Ugra has become easier and safer. A large-scale modernization was carried out at the Lokosovsky gas processing plant. Now high technologies make it possible to control units remotely, from the operator room. From here, through computers, you can start and stop equipment, change temperature and pressure. Automation is capable of preventing an emergency situation without human intervention, and special sensors will warn of gas emissions into the air. It is worth noting that about 400 million cubic meters of associated gas are supplied to the plant annually.
2. "Energokontrakt" has increased its capacity to develop new models and designs of workwear
The manufacturer of high-tech workwear made from aramid fabrics has increased its own capacity to develop new models and designs of workwear since the beginning of 2017, investing about 9 million rubles. The experimental service at the Energokontrakt enterprise in Tomilino (Moscow region) expanded its own area 7 times to 1350 m2. This will significantly speed up the process of creating new products and improving existing ones, and as a result, reduce the time it takes to launch them into production. Currently, more than 200 products made from “smart” fabrics are in production - clothing for protection from electric arcs, oil and petroleum products, sparks and splashes of molten metal, and mechanical damage. Technological workwear is used throughout the country and abroad by power engineers, oil workers, welders, and railway workers. The creation of each design and its preparation for mass production is a long process and an almost individual approach.
3. The Zvezda plant launched a workshop for the production of high-power gearboxes in St. Petersburg
The St. Petersburg plant of PJSC Zvezda, specializing in the production of diesel engines for military ships and civilian vessels, officially launched a workshop for the production of high-power gearboxes.
Modernized production site with a total area of 11,500 sq.m. expands the production and technological competencies of Zvezda PJSC as the leading Russian developer and manufacturer of heavy gearboxes for the Russian military and civil shipbuilding.
The site will allow the plant to increase the maximum weight of gearboxes produced from 25 tons to 50 tons, which will provide the opportunity to supply the plant’s products to large warships, including corvettes and frigates, being built at Severnaya Verf.
The gearbox is an integral part of the gas turbine unit; it allows the energy of the power plant to be transferred to the propellers of ships. Turbines for gas turbine units will be supplied by Rybinsk NPO Saturn, which has completed the pilot part of the work and has begun mass production.
New Western machines and a 50-ton crane were purchased for the site. The Ministry of Industry and Trade allocated 3.2 billion rubles from the federal budget for the implementation of the project. Today, 90% of the project is federal property, another 10% belongs to Zvezda, which invested in the project a plot of land and a building that was located on it before construction began.
Today, work is underway in the workshop to create the first gearbox for a hovercraft of the “Bison” type. In April, this gearbox will be tested in Rybinsk as part of the entire gas turbine unit.
The second stage of creating a workshop involves the purchase of a test bench. The plant plans to complete it by the end of this year.
4. Pellet production has been modernized in the Moscow region
In January 2017, the Bear Lake enterprise in the Moscow region modernized and upgraded the existing pellet production to greater productivity.
The Bear Lake company is engaged in wooden house construction: they build houses, bathhouses, and cabins. As a result of the production process at the enterprise, large quantities of wood waste are generated. For the past 3 years, the company has been operating a plant for the production of pellets from the resulting chips. In 2016, the company was faced with an increase in demand for products, and therefore a decision was made to increase production volumes. To achieve this goal, the equipment was modernized and a new granulator with greater productivity - 1.5 tons per hour - was purchased from the Russian manufacturer of granulation equipment Doza-Gran.
5.
A modern electric heating furnace was put into operation in heat shop No. 3 of Uralvagonzavod. The work took place as part of the modernization of production at the head enterprise of the UVZ corporation.
The new furnace is designed for low tempering - the final heat treatment operation of parts. The furnace temperature range is from 170 C° to 300 C°. The maximum weight of loaded parts is more than 3000 kilograms. The equipment allows for low-temperature tempering of various parts and welded assemblies.
The operating modes of the furnace are controlled by a computer, on which the worker sets the necessary parameters: temperature, time, speed of heating, holding and cooling - and then only monitors the progress of the process. To work on electric furnaces, the shop’s heat therapists have undergone special training.
The introduction of a new electric heating furnace with computer control will improve the quality of heat treatment of the part due to the reliable implementation of the established operating modes of the furnace, its modern design and the materials used.
6. The installation of new robots has been completed in the cabin welding and assembly shop of the KAMAZ press-frame plant
Fanuc robots are installed on the high roof welding line, where the roofs for KAMAZ cabs of four models are assembled. It is noteworthy that seven robots were replaced in two months without stopping production.
According to the project manager, head of the industrial electronics department Almas Gilmanov, the first generation of robots has been working on the automatic high roof welding line for the last 28 years. During this time, the machines wore out and could significantly affect the quality of welding. In order not to let down their colleagues from the automobile plant, PRZ specialists reduced the speed of the line; in this case, the commands were carried out by robots more accurately. In recent years, it was difficult to weld 15 roofs per hour, while the automatic lines on which other units were welded were designed for a speed of 40 pieces per hour.
“To ensure synchronization of the flow, the “roof” was welded without stopping, but even at this pace of work there were delays in sending the frames to the main assembly line. The modernization of the line was supposed to correct the situation, Gilmanov explained. “But if we updated the five lower robots, which have one controlled axis, then the improvement of the upper line of more complex units raised questions. The cost of spare parts for them exceeded the price of new cars. But now the equipment of the RZ has jumped through three generations of robots at once, and the fourth has replaced the first.”
“This is an environmentally friendly technology, since nitrogen is taken from the air and returned back without harmful impurities. For us, a clean stove is a mandatory issue for the social protection of workers. In addition, after seven to eight years of operation, the furnace will pay for itself only by saving electricity,” noted Vyacheslav Medvedev, Chairman of the Board of Directors of OJSC SIZ.
JSC SIZ specializes in the production of high-precision complex cutting tools, which are used in the machine tool, defense, oil and gas, agricultural, automotive and aviation industries.
In the Sverdlovsk region, a consistent industrial policy has been built for the development of the machine tool industry, and an industrial complex has been formed, including over 15 large, medium and small organizations. These enterprises produce more than three thousand types of products that are in demand in Russia and abroad.
12. Shvabe has expanded its capabilities in the field of processing optical parts
The enterprise of the Shvabe Holding put into operation a Taiwanese gantry milling machining center with CNC with numerical control. This high-tech equipment is capable of processing large optical parts measuring up to 3.7x4 meters and weighing up to 21 tons.
The new machine was put into operation in the first quarter of 2017 in the department for processing large-sized optics of the Shvabe Holding enterprise - Lytkarino Optical Glass Plant (LZOS). It was purchased as part of a comprehensive development plan for the LZOS enterprise.
“The large surface of the movable work table allows us to use this center to carry out highly efficient processing of long and large-sized workpieces for astronomical and space technology. And thanks to the presence of a rigid closed structure and a large store of various tools that change automatically, the processing of products will be carried out 10-15% faster than before,” said Alexander Ignatov, General Director of the Lytkarino Optical Glass Plant.
By the end of 2017, as part of the technical re-equipment plan, the Lytkarino Optical Glass Plant plans to purchase processing centers, as well as equipment for machining and foundry production.
13. NLMK Group is expanding infrastructure capabilities in the Belgorod region for production growth
An international steel company with assets in Russia, the European Union and the United States has begun hot testing of the second stage of the thickening unit of the tailings facility at the Stoilensky GOK.
According to the press service of the plant, the project will allow the enterprise to switch to a more efficient and environmentally friendly method of processing, transporting and storing waste rock (tailings) after enrichment. The new technology for handling waste rock, in contrast to the previous gravity system, provides for the extraction of liquid and further forced transportation of tailings in a condensed state.
This allows you to save natural resources - 80% of the process water used during transportation is returned to the enrichment process. In addition, dust in the tailings dump is significantly reduced.
The transition of Stoilensky GOK to new technology began in 2013 with the commissioning of the first stage of the thickening unit, which ensured the processing of about 13 million tons of mined ore per year (40% of the volume at that time). The launch of the second stage allows the new technology to cover 100% of the increased production volumes - up to 37 million tons per year starting in 2018.
Investments in the construction of the first stage of the condensation unit amounted to 2.7 billion rubles, the second stage - about 3.6 billion rubles.
As part of the project for the second stage of the thickening unit, a thickener and a slurry pumping station were built, which is designed to pump high-density pulp from the thickener into the process reservoir, and the pumping room was expanded. Five slurry pipelines leading to the tailings dump were built from the station.
The project used a unique thickener with increased power and efficiency. Due to the special design of the bowl, the productivity of the first thickener was 20 thousand cubic meters. m of pulp per hour, the second - 24 thousand cubic meters. m, this is one of the best, perhaps even the best, efficiency indicator in the global iron ore industry.
Technological processes throughout the entire chain are automated at the most modern level. Energy-saving LED lamps have been used at the condensation unit facilities, which will reduce energy costs and improve illumination of workplaces.
14. In St. Petersburg, JSC First Furniture opened a plant after reconstruction
The opening of the renovated First Furniture plant took place in St. Petersburg. The renewal of the production of First Furniture began in 2014. The volume of investment in the technical modernization of the factory amounted to 300 million rubles, of which 100 million rubles were provided by the St. Petersburg Industrial Development Fund in the form of a loan under the targeted business support program at a preferential rate of five percent per annum.
The production area of the plant amounted to 52 thousand square meters. During the project, two workshops of the plant with an area of 11.4 thousand square meters were completely renewed, a new workshop and a new warehouse complex were built.
As a result of reconstruction, the capacity of the production lines of First Furniture increased fivefold and allows the production of 50 thousand kitchen sets per year, the company has expanded the range of furniture produced, including kitchens, office furniture, bedrooms, living rooms, libraries, and furniture for children.
The First Furniture Factory has been operating on the Russian market since 1945. In total, the factory now employs about 300 people.
15. After deep modernization, the oldest sawmill complex in Arkhangelsk began work again
Today we are proud to present to you the result of the first stage of modernization of the production site of the 25th sawmill on the basis of the LDK-3 site,” said Dmitry Krylov, general director of JSC Lesozavod 25, at the opening of the complex. - This stage includes the launch of a sawlog sorting line, a completely new sawmill, and a boiler house for bark waste. The second stage of modernization is the construction of drying chambers and a dry lumber sorting line.
The investment project is planned to reach the finishing line by the end of 2017. After the implementation of this project, the production capacity of JSC Lesozavod 25, taking into account all three sites, will amount to more than 1.5 million cubic meters of sawn raw material processing per year and 150 thousand tons of fuel pellets annually.
The volume of investment in this project is 4.2 billion rubles. It is planned to create more than 1,200 high-tech jobs, including logging.
16. A new workshop for the production of larger diameter pipes has been opened at the MEGA-Steel enterprise in the Moscow region
The modernization of production at the MEGA-Steel plant in Mytishchi, Moscow Region, has been completed. Now the company has a new workshop for the production of electric-welded pipes without a circumferential weld in accordance with GOST 20295-85. LDPs are manufactured with diameters from 630 to 1020 mm.
The workshop is equipped with modern equipment that meets domestic and European standards. Production volumes will allow the enterprise to provide large supplies of high-quality products to representatives of the construction, oil and gas industries
17. Investments in the modernization of the Orsk Oil Refinery amount to $1.2 billion
Investments in the modernization of the Orsk oil refinery company ForteInvest will amount to $1.2 billion, Russian businessman Mikhail Gutseriev said in an interview with the Rossiya 24 TV channel.
He noted that the modernization of the plant will be completed in January 2018.
“We are finishing the Orsk Oil Refinery in January. The volume of investment is $1.2 billion, the depth of processing is up to 90%. The plant was built in 1940, but in four years we managed to build a new plant,” he said.
The Orsk Refinery (Orsknefteorgsintez) is an oil refining enterprise with an installed capacity of 6 million tons of oil per year. The plant produces motor gasoline, diesel fuel, jet fuel, bitumen and fuel oil.
In 2016, the Orsk Refinery processed 4.527 million tons of crude oil. During the reporting period, 769.78 thousand tons of gasoline were produced. The production volume of diesel fuel at the end of 2016 amounted to more than 1.077 million tons, jet fuel - more than 260 thousand tons, bitumen - 286 thousand tons.
The shareholder of the Orsknefteorgsintez company is the ForteInvest company, controlled by the Safmar financial and industrial group of Mikhail Gutseriev.
18. Galaktika Corporation automates Uralvagonzavod
Galaktika Corporation, a Russian developer of corporate information systems, has begun creating a prototype of an automated cooperative production management system for JSC Research and Production Corporation Uralvagonzavod in the pilot zone.
Uralvagonzavod is a corporation engaged in the development and production of military equipment, road construction machines, and railway cars. The new system from Galaktika will increase the efficiency of production of special equipment, reduce costs and speed up the adoption of informed management decisions with full control over the status of order execution.
The project will be implemented on the basis of one of the most popular products of the corporation - “Galaktika AMM”. The system is designed to increase the efficiency of production of special equipment through optimal planning of production capacity throughout the chain of cooperation, reducing costs, as well as ensuring the adoption of informed management decisions and reducing dependence on the human factor when monitoring the status of order execution. In the future, an automated system
Sooner or later, any enterprise requires production modernization. Most often this occurs due to expansion or the need to improve overall efficiency. However, outdated or end-of-life equipment is also a compelling argument for starting this process.
Modernization of production represents a comprehensive (replacement of outdated units), partial (replacement of a sector) or complete update of systems or equipment at the enterprise. This process entails a number of activities, most of which involve careful analysis and collection of information. This applies both to the state of production itself and to the study of proposals from suppliers of equipment and services. In general, depending on the size of the enterprise, its financial capabilities and modernization plans, the implementation of these measures can take from several months to a year and a half.
Modernization stages and their brief description
Like any process, production modernization has its stages. The first three stages are directly related to the analysis of all available information and statistics. The decision to modernize occurs provided that all the necessary prerequisites exist for this, such as:
- the need to increase productivity;
- a large percentage of equipment that is damaged and cannot be repaired;
- lack of effectiveness;
- a large percentage of outdated equipment;
- planned expansion of production.
Selection of equipment and suppliers
Selecting equipment and suppliers also requires consideration. This is due to the fact that the further efficiency and payback of the enterprise depends on the quality and characteristics of the equipment. The reliability of suppliers affects the speed of the modernization process and its cost. It is important to note that the stage of searching for equipment and suppliers should begin simultaneously with the consideration of the need for modernization. This will allow you to compare the current situation with the prospects that the new equipment will provide.
Forming a business plan will help streamline the entire process and calculate the costs and payback time of the measures taken.
Modernization of production will require attracting credit resources. It is rare that an enterprise can afford such events at its own expense. However, an agreement with suppliers can be concluded without waiting for the loan to be opened - it is enough to obtain confirmation of approval of the request from the lender.
The longest stage is the supply of equipment. It may take several months. As a rule, it is supplied from different manufacturers, which may be located far from the customer enterprise, even to another country and even continent.
Installation takes place quickly (if we talk about large enterprises - up to a month), since by the time the equipment arrives, the enterprise has already either improved the qualifications of its staff or hired specialists.
Trial operation is needed to identify problems and final installation.
The last three stages are the final stages, during which the equipment undergoes final tests and begins to operate normally. Typically, final commissioning takes up to three months.
Search for suppliers and equipment
Expocentre Fairgrounds regularly holds industry exhibitions where suppliers present their best products. Events of this kind are an excellent way to get acquainted with the entire range and select several options for suppliers and equipment models that could be used during production modernization.
About 75% of all funds allocated to industry were intended for the development of the backbone of industrialization - heavy industry.
When assessing the first five-year plan, many historians emphasize the contribution of old, experienced economists, many of whom had pre-revolutionary experience, to its development. The balance and scientific validity of the planned indicators are noted, which, despite their scale, were quite feasible. Other researchers, on the contrary, draw attention to the lack of experience in long-term planning, miscalculations of developers, and unrealistic tasks. Whoever was right, life soon made adjustments to the implementation of the first five-year plan. The successes of the first months of industrialization gave the Soviet leadership confidence in the possibility of even faster development of the country, the initial calculations were discarded, and administrative acceleration of industrial growth began. The international factor, which constantly weighed on the country, also played its role in increasing the initially approved tasks. In 1929, the economies of Western countries were struck by the deepest economic crisis in the entire interwar period. This, firstly, sharply reduced our country’s ability to use the export of machinery and machine tools from abroad, which was calculated on when drawing up the five-year plans. We had to organize the production of the necessary equipment in our country, revising plan targets, speeding up the development of basic industries. Secondly, the global economic crisis increased the military threat, which also forced the acceleration of the pace of industrialization.
In December 1929, at the congress of shock workers, Stalin put forward the slogan “Five-Year Plan in Four Years.” The right-wing opposition was defeated by this time, and the leader’s call did not find serious resistance. In the summer of 1930, at the 16th Congress of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, which went down in history as “the congress of the extensive offensive of socialism along the entire front,” the accelerated version of industrialization was finally consolidated. In his speech, Stalin declared that by the end of the Five-Year Plan the annual production of pig iron could and should be
17 million tons, tractors - up to 170 thousand units, cars - up to 200 thousand units. Thus, the already intense tasks of the five-year plan were raised by an average of two times.
Inconsistency in matters of economic construction has led to overexertion of the country's forces and given rise to acute negative phenomena.
Thus, in 1932, the actual growth of industry was only 14.7%, while 32% was planned. The growth rate fell especially catastrophically in 1933, amounting to only 5%. The cost of industrial products increased, their energy intensity, and quality, on the contrary, fell. As a result of errors in planning and miscalculations in the economy, the country's financial system began to decline. As a result, it was necessary to stop funding 613 of the 1,659 major projects under construction. Due to a lack of appropriations, plans had to be curtailed, including in such key industries as metallurgy.
Other difficulties also accumulated. The communications system lagged behind the ever-increasing pace of industrialization - railway, sea and river transport remained a bottleneck. Of the new transport routes envisaged in the construction plan, only a third was put into operation, and radical modernization of transport never began. Serious imbalances developed in the national economy: light industry was actually sacrificed to heavy industry and began to lag further and further behind it. It was during the years of the “Great Leap Forward” that many deep disproportions were formed,
§ 2. Modernization of industry 19
Mentors of young workers. 1930s
which for many decades will be inherent in the economy of the USSR.
The Soviet leadership often sought to solve problems that arose by tightening discipline. In February 1931, work books were introduced for workers in industry. Now the transition of workers from one enterprise to another in search of better working conditions was difficult. Another measure limiting the freedom of workers was the law of November 15, 1932, according to which anyone absent from work for one day could be fired. Following his dismissal, he lost all his rights that his job provided: free housing, a food card, etc. On December 4, 1932, the Council of People's Commissars and the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) issued another resolution aimed at eliminating the remnants of revolutionary freemen in labor relations: the food supply of workers was made dependent on compliance with disciplinary standards and was placed under the control of the management.
It was during the years of the first Five-Year Plan, faced with economic difficulties, that the Soviet leadership tried to find a way out through the use of forced labor of prisoners. In April 1930, a decree was issued on the dis-
20 | Chapter XI. USSR in the context of modernization of the national economy
A team of metro workers by V. Fedorova. 1935
the expansion of labor camps, which were transferred to the jurisdiction of the Main Directorate of Camps - the notorious Gulag. Prison labor was used in construction, swamp drainage, logging, and industrial projects. Many important national economic facilities were erected with their hands.
At the same time, the implementation of the five-year plan continued. Millions of people were imbued with the atmosphere of labor feat. Socialist competition was unfolding in the country, the main form of which in these years was shock work. By the third year of the Five-Year Plan, at least a million people worked in shock brigades. Another form of socialist competition is counter planning, when labor collectives put forward counter, higher obligations. Counterplanning was based on the use of internal production reserves and gave rise to a broad rationalization movement. To manage inventive and rationalization activities, in April 1931, a special Invention Committee was formed at the USSR Service Station. During the first five-year plan, it received more than 40 thousand applications for various inventions. Saving
§ 2. Modernization of industry [21
as a result of the introduction of technical innovations by workers and engineers into production during this period amounted to at least 370 million rubles.
The country has literally turned into a single construction site. Reconstruction of old factories was underway in Moscow, Leningrad, Gorky, the Urals and Donbass. New enterprises were built. They were equipped with the most advanced equipment at that time, and no expense was spared in purchasing it. The projects of many of the firstborns of Soviet industrialization were ordered abroad: in America or Germany. For many foreigners who visited the USSR in those years, these grandiose construction projects of socialism seemed like a miracle. New projects of Soviet industry often began to be built in the bare steppe, where there was no infrastructure, no local energy base, nothing, but soon the buildings of new factories, power plant dams, and entire cities grew up. In total, about 1,500 important industrial facilities were built during the first five-year plan. Among them were such giants as the Dneproges, Magnitka, Stalingrad and Kharkov tractor plants, Moscow and Gorky automobile plants. Traffic opened on the Tur-Kestano-Siberian Railway. A new powerful coal and metallurgical base was created in the East of the country - the Ural-Kuzbass.
In 1932, the Stalinist leadership announced that the first five-year plan had been completed ahead of schedule - in 4 years and 3 months. In fact, only 93.7% of the tasks under the first five-year plan were completed, but such results were unprecedented in world history at that time. On average, the volume of output of large-scale industry in 1932 exceeded more than three times the pre-war level and more than twice the level of 1928. Its share in the gross output of the national economy reached 70%. By 1932, electricity production amounted to 13.5 billion kWh, coal - 64.4 million tons, cast iron - 6.2 million tons, steel - 5.9 million tons, tractors - 49 thousand, cars - 24 thousand pieces. The main goal of the first five-year plan - to transfer the domestic economy to the rails of intensive industrial movement - was achieved. The USSR was turning from a country importing industrial equipment into a country producing equipment. Through the labor of millions of people in the country, an advanced technical base was created that could ensure the further reconstruction of the national economy, relying primarily on their own strength.
22 I Chapter XI. USSR in the context of modernization of the national economy
The lessons of the first five-year plan forced the Soviet leadership to adjust their approaches to industrialization methods. Speaking in January 1933 at the Plenum of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, Stalin said that there was no longer a need to “spur and urge the country on” and that the excessive pace of industrial restructuring should be abandoned. The second five-year plan for the development of the national economy for 1933-1937. was approved at the XVII Congress of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) held in January-February 1934, called the “Congress of the Winners”. The final indicators contained in it were significantly higher than in the first five-year plan. Electricity production by the end of the five-year plan was planned to increase to 38 billion kWh, cast iron - to 16 million tons, steel - to 17 million tons, oil and gas - to 46.8 million tons. It was planned to increase labor productivity in industry by 63 %, and reduce production costs by 26%. During the Second Five-Year Plan, the course of creating new industrial support bases in the East of the country was continued. Up to half of all capital investments in new construction in heavy industry were directed to the regions of the Urals, Western and Eastern Siberia, and Central Asia.
At the same time, the planned targets of the second five-year plan were more balanced. Thus, the average annual growth rate of industrial production decreased to 16.5% against 30% in the first five-year plan. Compared to the first five-year plan, there was a significant increase in funds allocated to light industry, which should have given it the opportunity to develop at a higher rate than heavy industry (18.5% and 14.5% growth per year, respectively), and provide the population with a sufficient amount of consumer goods. In accordance with this, plans were made for a significant increase in the living standards of the population. It was planned that by raising wages, reducing retail prices by 35% and other measures, the level of consumption in the country would rise by 2-3 times.
The methods of implementing industrialization policies have changed. In contrast to the military-communist methods of the first five-year plan, during the years of implementation of the second five-year plan there is a certain resuscitation of economic methods of management and stimulation of labor activity. The emphasis is on self-financing, economic independence
§ 2. Modernization of industry I 23
activity of enterprises and the material interest of workers in increasing production and improving its quality. Once again, the ideas of the withering away of money and its displacement by direct product exchange and centralized distribution were condemned as leftist. From high stands they started talking about the need to improve finances and strengthen the ruble as the basis of the country's economic independence.
Experiments were widely carried out in production to improve the system of economic management of industry. Behind many of the initiatives of those years was the head of the Supreme Economic Council, and then the People's Commissariat of Heavy Industry, S. Ordzhonikidze. Thus, in 1934, he supported the proposal of representatives of the Makeevka Metallurgical Plant, who declared their readiness to switch to work without government subsidies. Three months later, the Makeevites proved they were right. Then the NKTP decided to extend the experience of the Makeyevka plant to the entire heavy industry, which allowed
Georgy (Sergo) Konstantinovich Ordzhonikidze (1886-1937) was born in Georgia. From the nobles. By education, he is a paramedic. Since 1903 - Bolshevik. He began revolutionary activities in Georgia and Azerbaijan. In 1910-1911 studied at a party school in Longjumeau (France). Since 1912 - member of the Central Committee of the RSDLP(b). He was arrested several times. In 1915 he was exiled to Yakutsk, where he met the February Revolution. In the spring of 1917 - member of the Revolutionary Committee, commissioner of the Yakutsk Public Security Committee. Since June 1917, he has been in Petrograd, carrying out a number of important assignments (he was a liaison between the Central Committee and Lenin, who was underground). Participant in the October armed uprising, resistance to Kerensky - Krasnov. From December 1917, the Extraordinary Commissioner in Ukraine, from the spring of 1918, with the same powers, was transferred to the south of Russia. He played a prominent role in the fight against Denikin and the Sovietization of the North Caucasus and Transcaucasia. In 1920-1926. - Chairman of the Caucasian Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP (b), secretary of the Transcaucasian regional committee of the party. In 1926-1930 headed the Central Control Commission and the People's Commissariat of the Workers' and Peasants' Inspection From December 1930 - member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and chairman of the Supreme Council of the National Economy, from 1932 - People's Commissar of Heavy Industry Significant achievements in these positions are associated with his activities in these positions modernization of industry in the USSR. Possessing a tough character and preferring harsh administrative methods of leadership, Ordzhonikidze, at the same time, tried to protect the workers of his People's Commissariat and economic personnel from unjustified persecution, as a result of which his relations with the NKVD and the “leader of the people” worsened. Ordzhonikidze’s death from heart palsy was officially announced . According to one of the existing versions, he committed suicide after falling into depression; there is also a version of his murder in the literature.
24 I Chapter XI. USSR in the context of modernization of the national economy
By the end of 1936, it was necessary to significantly reduce the volume of government funds allocated for the development of the industry. In 1936, the experience of economic regulation of the economy was expanded. In accordance with the law “On the self-supporting rights of the main departments” adopted this year, the heads of the industrial people's commissariats were given the right to manage working capital, have accounts in the State Bank, and engage in sales and supply activities.
The New Deal did not mean the legalization of private capital, however, measures in the sphere of state industry were reminiscent of the economic liberalism of the 1920s. The reform policy also affected ordinary citizens. Back in 1931, Stalin stated that wages should depend on productivity. In the years of the Second Five-Year Plan, emphasis is placed on the fight against “depersonalization” and “equalization”. In 1935, piecework wages were introduced in industry, construction and transport, which increased the interest of workers in increasing the quantity and quality of products. At the same time, a transition was made to a system of labor differentiation - now the size of the salary was linked to working conditions, the degree of its complexity, the qualifications and experience of workers. A system of material incentives for labor arose, which encouraged not only shock workers, but also all workers to improve their skills, take a more responsible approach to the assigned work, and fight to increase labor productivity. In a certificate from the USSR State Planning Committee in 1935, it was noted on this matter: “In all sectors of the national economy where progressive piecework wages were used, we received a tremendous economic effect, expressed primarily in a huge increase in labor productivity... A particularly large effect was achieved progressive piecework wages in heavy industry, ferrous and non-ferrous metallurgy, coal, mechanical engineering and chemistry.”
The measures taken led to stabilization of the economic situation and improvement of living conditions. On January 1, 1935, bread cards were abolished. Following this, from October 1, 1935, cards for meat products, fats, sugar, potatoes were abolished, and from January 1, 1936, the card distribution system for non-food products was eliminated. The heavier ruble, which has returned to its real value, is becoming an effective means for deeper implementation of economic incentives. The moral prestige of conscientious work also increases. Instead of the slogan first
§ 2. Modernization of industry 25
five-year plan “Technology decides everything!”, During the second five-year plan, Stalin put forward a new one: “Personnel decide everything!” Good work becomes prestigious. Leading production workers turn out to be the heroes of newspaper essays, their portraits adorn “boards of honor” at factory entrances and on the central streets of cities. Soviet patriotism, the desire to help the Fatherland catch up and surpass the developed countries of the world, to prove that the Soviet worker is in no way inferior to the European or American, are important motives for highly productive labor.
In this atmosphere of the mid-1930s. The Stakhanov movement arises, which played an important role in the implementation of the plans of the second five-year plan. The name of the movement was given by Donetsk miner Alexei Stakhanov. He initiated the introduction of a brigade labor organization at his mine, when each worker specialized in performing only a certain type of work. This allowed us to save overall work time and improve its quality. On the night of August 31 to September 1, 1935, Stakhanov and his comrades set a world record, exceeding the daily coal production rate by 14 times. On September 19, Stakhanov set another record, producing 207 tons of coal per shift (the norm is 7 tons). The feat of Stakhanov and his team showed that almost any worker (Stakhanov at that time was not a member of the party, having joined it in 1936) can achieve improved results.
Stakhanov's experience gained all-Union fame. In order to promote it in every possible way, in 1935 the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks held the All-Union Conference of Stakhanovites. In the same year, the Plenum of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) obliged all local party and Soviet bodies to provide the Stakhanovites with all possible support. The Stakhanov movement quickly spread throughout all sectors of industry. He even found a place in the Gulag system. The Stakhanovites received increased material rewards for their work. The modern American historian S. Kotkin, who deeply analyzed the history of Magnitka as a kind of “showcase” of the Stalinist system of the 1930s, generally has a positive assessment of the Stakhanov movement and provides the following data on the financial situation of the most notable Stakhanovites of Magnitka: Mikhail Zuev earned 18 in 1936 524 rubles (with an average salary of 170 rubles per month), and the entire Zuev working family (Mikhail himself and his three sons Fedor, Vasily and Arseny, also Stakhanovites) earned 54 thousand rubles in a year; second after Zuev in terms of salary was blooming operator Ogorodnikov, who earned
26 | Chapter XI. USSR in the context of modernization of the national economy
same year 17,774 rubles; another Stakhanovite, Vladimir Shevchuk, earned about 935 rubles a month in 1935, and 1,169 rubles in 1936. Stakhanovites were rewarded with vouchers, motorcycles, cars, apartments; cash bonuses sometimes reached 10,000 rubles.
The Stakhanov movement also had its downsides. The pursuit of records gave rise to postscripts; it happened that the results of entire teams were presented as the achievement of one person who performed the final operation in a long production cycle. There were “examples” when, in order to achieve a separate record, all resources were transferred to a narrow area, which was accompanied by a general lag of the enterprise. These and many other phenomena were condemned at the top of the party already in 1935, but they could not be completely eradicated even later. In addition, the Stakhanov movement had its technological limits. For example, at Magnitogorsk (and not only there), the desire for records rested on the capabilities of technology. Ignoring technical regulations led to the destruction of expensive equipment, and those who warned about the danger were declared counter-revolutionary elements or people of little faith.
The attitude towards the Stakhanovites on the part of the workers was different. For those accustomed to working the old fashioned way, lazily, the Stakhanovites’ achievement of new, increased standards of labor productivity turned into a need to overcome their own slackness and incompetence. But on the whole, the Stakhanov movement met with warm support from the working people. The combination of moral and material incentives in the Stakhanov movement significantly expanded the basis of socialist competition compared to the years of the first five-year plan. The number of Stakhanovites constantly increased; entire sections, brigades, and workshops became Stakhanovites. The so-called Stakhanov schools, where advanced workers directly at their workplaces passed on their experience to other workers. The first such school was created in 1935 at the Paris Commune shoe factory by Stakhanovist order-bearer S. Yakushin, and soon they appeared at many industrial enterprises in the capital and other cities. By January 1, 1938, approximately every fourth Soviet worker was considered a Stakhanovite. Stakhanov himself, as well as his followers blacksmith A. Busygin, machinist P. Krivonos, machine builder I. Gudov, textile workers Evdokia and Maria Vinogradov, metro construction worker V. Fedorov became, in fact, national heroes and a symbol of their time.
§ 2. Modernization of industry 27
Along with mass enthusiasm and devotion during the Second Five-Year Plan, the use of forced labor continued. By the end of the forced modernization, there were 1,668,200 prisoners in prison, whose labor was widely used in the construction of the White Sea-Baltic Canal, the Moscow-Volga Canal, Magnitka, and other high-impact construction projects. In addition, the labor of special settlers was used for forced labor (since 1934 they began to be called labor settlers). In 1934, 255 thousand were sent to labor settlements, in 1935 - 246 thousand, in 1936 - 165 thousand, in 1937 - 128 thousand people. The total number of labor settlers, compared to 1931, when it reached its maximum, decreased by almost 450 thousand and amounted to 878 thousand people. The working conditions of the settlers and prisoners were incredibly difficult, but to call it slave labor, as is done in modern journalism, would also be unfair. Persons who showed their best side could count not only on early release, but also on receiving orders and medals, high material rewards, and a further successful career. At the same time, backbreaking work, abuse, and everyday disorder led to high mortality among Gulag prisoners and labor settlers, and the forced nature of labor sharply reduced its effectiveness.
During the years of the Second Five-Year Plan, the Soviet state took a big step forward. Despite the fact that plans for the development of light industry and growth in the well-being of the population could not be fully implemented, the results of the second five-year plan turned out to be more impressive than those of the first five-year plan. The Stakhanov movement made it possible to increase labor productivity not by 63%, as planned, but by 82% against 41% in the first five-year plan. Due to the growth of labor productivity, it was possible to achieve 2/3 of the total increase in industrial production. Gross industrial output increased 2.2 times compared to two times in the first five-year plan, although the number of workers and employees now grew 4 times slower. 4,500 large enterprises came into operation.
28 I Chapter XI. USSR in the context of modernization of the national economy
In mechanical engineering, for example, by 1937 the share of new or completely reconstructed factories was 88.6%, while only 11.4% remained of factories with predominantly pre-revolutionary equipment. Oil production was increased by approximately 1.4 times, coal production by 2 times, electricity by 2.7 times, and rolled steel production increased by more than 3 times. One of the most important results of the second five-year plan, according to modern historians, was the successes achieved in the formation of the country's military-industrial complex, which now included dozens of the most modern factories throughout the country.
Positive changes in the development of the domestic industrial base have made it possible to abandon grain exports in favor of purchasing machinery and industrial equipment. Costs for importing ferrous metals decreased from 1.4 billion rubles. in the first five-year plan up to 88 million rubles. in the second. Imports of machine tools for the engineering industry decreased in total volume from 66% in 1928 to 14% in 1935. In general, imports of machines during the Second Five-Year Plan decreased by more than 10 times compared to the last years of the First Five-Year Plan, and the need for imports in the country of tractors and cars disappeared completely. In 1936, the share of imported products in the country's total consumption was less than one percent. Since 1934, the USSR already had an active foreign trade balance, and debt on foreign loans from 6,300 million rubles. in 1931 it decreased to 400 million rubles. in 1936. All these indicators indicated that the country had gained economic independence and the high effectiveness of the chosen option for socio-economic development.
Industrialization greatly changed the face of Soviet society. During the years of the first five-year plans, the USSR turned from a country that imported machine tools and machinery into a country that produced them. The number of the working class during this time increased by approximately 20 million people. New industrial areas were developed in the East of the country. Entire industries arose in the country that did not exist in Tsarist Russia: aviation, tractor, electric power, chemical, etc. In terms of production volume, the country, as a result of the success of industrialization, took 1st place in Europe and 2nd place in the world. The Soviet Union became one of the states capable of dispensing with the import of essential goods and independently producing any type of product known to mankind at that time, and this status was maintained for several decades
§ 2. Modernization of industry I 29
during the entire subsequent existence of the USSR as a single state.
Forced industrialization had a negative impact on the social sphere. The industrial tribute resulted in a decrease in the standard of living for the domestic village, the unprofitability of a significant number of collective farms, and for the state as a whole - a decrease in the growth rate of agriculture, the emergence and deepening of imbalances in the national economy, in the development of industry and the agricultural sector, city and village.
The burden of industrialization was also borne by the urban population, which was supplied from 1929 to 1935. by cards. The actual food supply standards were significantly lower than those provided by the government. For example, qualified weavers were given ration cards: 1 kg of cereal, 0.5 kg of meat, 1.5 kg of fish and 0.8 kg of sugar per month. The supply standards for teachers, health workers, and students were much lower. During these years, such social ills as shortages, cronyism, privileges, the “black market”, nonsense, flyers, and hours-long queues developed.
But overcoming everyday adversities, the pre-war generation of Soviet people withstood the tests of time with dignity and in record time transformed the industrial appearance of the country, created a powerful military-industrial potential that allowed the people of our country to pass the difficult historical test of the Great Patriotic War.
Village: “revolution from above”
The new economic policy, although implemented by the Bolsheviks very inconsistently, allowed the Russian peasantry in a relatively short time to restore the productive forces of the domestic countryside, undermined by two wars (the First World War and especially the Civil War), as well as the revolutionary upheavals of 1917.
Chapter XI. USSR in the context of modernization of the national economy
The restoration process in the agricultural sector during the NEP years proceeded non-stop, but extremely unevenly: the starting and subsequent spurts of the 1924/25 and 1925/26 economic years (then they covered the time from October of one year to September 30 of the next) were replaced by periods of slow growth occurring in the third and the last years of NEP. This was due to the sales crisis of 1923 and a sharp redistribution of national income in the interests of industrialization of the country based on the decisions of the XIV Congress of the RCP (b). In order to come close to the level of agricultural production of the pre-war period, the country took about five years, which indicates that the Russian peasantry successfully used the modest capabilities of the NEP. “Albeit unequal, but still cooperation between the state and the private economy,” as B. Brutskus put it, which lies at the basis of this policy, took place. The peasantry not only managed to restore the productive forces of the village, but also helped the state pull the entire national economy out of the quagmire of the deepest crisis. It paid for full-fledged food products and raw materials for domestic industry for depreciated paper money, bearing the brunt of the financial reform of 1924.
Peasant farming has once again proven its ability to increase labor efforts, minimizing its own needs to recreate the basic foundations of the country's economic life. Now, not half the burden of the state budget, as in pre-revolutionary times, but three quarters of it fell on the shoulders of the peasant, who lost 645 million rubles in an unequal exchange with the city.
Although the rate of growth in agriculture in 1922-1925. and looked generally impressive, it would be deeply erroneous to imagine the Russian village of this time as a kind of “peasant country of Muravia”, “peasant Atlantis”, where universal equality, prosperity, labor cooperation reigned and where only an inveterate quitter and a bitter drunkard violated worldly unity and harmony . And this is precisely how some historians and publicists who wrote about the NEP during the period of the so-called “perestroika” tried to portray the life of a Soviet village in the twenties.
In order to substantively highlight the contradictory nature of the socio-economic processes that took place in the Russian village during the time of interest to us, let us compare it with the development of the peasant economy in the pre-revolutionary decade. Common to the consumer market was the predominance
§ 3. Village: “revolution from above” | 31
subsistence-consumer type of peasant farms and the strong influence of the state on them, but the conditions in which these farms operated were fundamentally different. In pre-revolutionary times, agriculture developed in an environment of a mixed and truly multi-structured market capitalist economy, when its production grew at a faster rate than the size of not only the rural, but also the entire population of Russia. In the twenties, the peasant economy had to exist within the framework of a transitional administrative-market, planned-commodity system - formally also a multi-structure, but in fact - a two-sector economy, in which agricultural production did not rise to the previous level, and its growth rate lagged behind the rate of growth as rural , as well as the entire population of the country.
These differences were determined by the fact that the new conditions of existence for the peasant economy were associated with greater losses than gains. The average increase as a result of the transfer of privately owned land to peasants was, according to N. Kondratiev’s calculations, 0.5 dessiatines. on the farm and could not make up for the drop in its capital supply, which in 1925/26 amounted to 83% of the 1913 level, and in the value of working livestock - 66%. Due to the fact that the country's population grew faster than gross grain harvests, grain production per capita decreased from 584 kg in pre-war times to 484.4 kg in 1928/29.
But the decline in agricultural marketability was especially acute. Before the war, half of the grain was collected on landowner and kulak farms, which produced 71% of commercial grain, including export grain. The homogenization of the countryside, which occurred during the post-revolutionary period, contributed to the fact that instead of the 16 million pre-war peasant farms in 1923, there were 25-26 million farms. Previously, they (without kulaks and landowners) produced 50% of all grain, and consumed 60%, and now (without kulaks) 85 and 70%, respectively. In 1927/28, the state prepared 630 million poods. grain against the pre-war 1,300.6 million. But if the amount of grain at the state’s disposal was now almost half as much, then its export had to be reduced by 20 times.
The naturalization of the peasant economy was the deep basis of the grain procurement crises that constantly threatened the country at that time. Grain procurement difficulties were aggravated by low agricultural, especially grain, prices. Before World War I
32 I Chapter XI. USSR in the context of modernization of the national economy
Distribution of products to members of the agricultural commune. 1934
the agricultural ruble was equal to 90 kopecks, and in the mid-20s it was about 50. In addition, the bread producer received only half the price; the rest was absorbed by the swollen overhead costs of Vneshtorg, state and cooperative bodies involved in the procurement and sale of grain on the domestic and foreign markets. The peasant also suffered significant losses due to the deterioration in the quality of goods purchased in exchange for bread and other agricultural products, the disappearance of imports and the constant shortage of goods in the village, which, according to the authoritative opinion of A. Chelintsev, did not receive more than 70% of manufactured goods.
This was the price the Russian peasantry paid for the country’s relatively successful solution to the problems of the recovery period along the path of the new economic policy.
The new, incomparably larger-scale tasks of overcoming economic backwardness and ensuring the economic independence of the country required unprecedented sacrifices and hardships from the domestic village. This turn of events was not unexpected. In general terms, back in 1924, it was foreseen by E. Preobrazhensky, who understood that the most difficult problem would arise at the end of the recovery period, in connection with resolving the issue of savings and their sources.
§ 3. Village: “revolution from above” | 33
Without creating any illusions regarding the efficiency of the public sector, as well as the possibility and feasibility of the influx of foreign capital (namely, many were betting on the latter at that time: the Bolsheviks L. Krasin, M. Litvinov, and their like-minded people from the galaxy of outstanding Russian economists: N. Kondratiev and A. Chayanov), Preobrazhensky relied mainly on the transfer of funds from the “non-socialist” sector, represented by peasant farming, for the exploitation of internal colonies, and for the withdrawal of maximum funds from the countryside.
Looking ahead a little, it should be noted that already in the year of the “great turning point” it became clear that by abandoning the NEP it would be much easier and simpler to solve the problem of accumulation. In the article “The Year of the Great Turning Point,” I. Stalin triumphantly cited data on the growth of capital investments in large industry from 1.6 billion rubles. in 1928 to 3.4 billion in 1929, i.e. more than two times. Even taking into account the significant hidden price increases, the result seemed amazing. The secret of this achievement was simple: it was largely ensured by the predominantly non-economic, essentially free confiscation of bread and other products from the peasants, as well as a 1.5-fold increase in timber exports per year due to the use of free labor in logging of repressed people and those who fled from exorbitant taxes peasants
During the NEP era, violent measures to confiscate food from peasants began to be widely used for the first time in the conditions of the grain procurement crisis of the winter of 1927/28. Formally, the object of such measures was declared to be kulaks who were delaying the sale of bread to the state in order to increase the price of bread. A directive was given to bring them to trial under Article 107 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR, which provides for imprisonment for up to 3 years with confiscation of all or part of the property. As in the times of the notorious “war communism,” in order to interest the poor in the fight against holders of large surpluses, it was recommended that 25% of confiscated grain be distributed among them at low state prices or as a long-term loan.
The position of the kulaks was also undermined by increased taxation, confiscation of surplus land, forced purchase of tractors, complex machines and other measures.
Under the influence of such a policy, kulak farms began to curtail production, sell off livestock and equipment,
34 I Chapter XI. USSR in the context of modernization of the national economy
especially cars, the desire to move to cities and other areas has increased in their families. According to the USSR Central Statistical Office, the number of kulak farms in the RSFSR decreased in 1927 from 3.9 to 2.2%, in 1929 in Ukraine - from 3.8 to 1.4%.
However, the use of emergency measures was not limited only to the farms of kulaks and wealthy peasants; it increasingly hit the middle peasantry, and sometimes even the poor. Under the pressure of unbearable assignments for grain procurements and pressure from secretaries and members of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks - I. Stalin, V. Molotov, A. Mikoyan and others - specially sent to the grain regions - local party and state bodies took the path of wholesale searches and arrests, peasants were often confiscated not only supplies, but seed grain and even household belongings. V. Yakovenko, who in the first years of NEP worked as the People's Commissar of Agriculture of the RSFSR, having visited the villages of his native Kansk district of Siberia in the summer of 1928, wrote to Stalin that as a result of the application of emergency measures, “the peasants... walk as if with a broken back. The prevailing opinion among the peasants is that the Soviet government does not want the peasant to live tolerably.” An even more vivid sketch of the state of affairs in the Don villages was given by M. Sholokhov in a letter sent on June 18 from Veshenskaya to Moscow. In it, the writer reported that he was “drawn into the whirlpool of grain procurements” and said: “...You should look at what is happening here and in the neighboring Lower Volga region. They press their fists, but the middle peasants are already crushed. The poor are starving, property, including samovars and cavities, is sold in the Khoper district to the most true middle peasant, often even the poor. The people are going wild, the mood is depressed, next year the sowing wedge will be catastrophically reduced. And as a result of skillfully applied pressure on the kulak, there is a fact (a monstrous fact!) of the appearance of fully formed political gangs on the territory of the neighboring district... And what happened in April, in May! Confiscated cattle died in the village bases, mares were foaled, and the foals were devoured by pigs (the cattle were all at the same bases), and all this in front of those who did not sleep at night, walked and looked after the mares... After that, let's talk about the union with the middle peasants. After all, the Axis did all this in relation to the middle peasants.”
The letter was sent to the Central Committee, and Stalin became aware of it. Similar information came to him from many other areas and sources. During the procurement of the 1929 harvest, the orgy of violence became even more widespread. On June 17, the North Caucasus Regional Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks sent out
§ 3. Village: “revolution from above” | 35
place the directive “On measures to eliminate kulak sabotage of grain procurements,” in which he proposed to carry out, through meetings of the poor and gatherings, “decrees on the eviction from the villages and the deprivation of land shares of those kulaks who did not complete the distribution and in whom grain surpluses would be found hidden ... or distributed for storage to other farms.” Reporting on the conduct of this campaign, the secretary of the regional committee A. Andreev wrote to Stalin at the end of the year that all efforts were devoted to completing grain procurements in the region - more than 5 thousand workers of the regional and district scale, 30-35 thousand farms were fined and largely sold. , almost 20 thousand people were put on trial, about 600 were shot. The same arbitrariness happened in Siberia, the Lower and Middle Volga regions, in Ukraine, the Far East, and in the republics of Central Asia.
All this allows us to consider the grain procurement emergency of 1928 and especially 1929 as a prelude to the deployment of complete collectivization and mass dispossession, as well as a kind of reconnaissance in force that the Bolshevik regime carried out before deciding on a general battle in the fight for the “new village” . Observant contemporaries-eyewitnesses then noticed the close relationship between the named “shock” economic and political campaigns in the village. The peculiarity of the collectivization campaign was that “it was a direct continuation of the grain procurement campaign,” emphasized G. Ushakov (a student and follower of A. Chayanov) in his manuscript “Siberia on the eve of sowing”, who observed how the “revolution from above” began and progressed "in a West Siberian and Ural village. - For some reason, this circumstance is not taken into account properly. People sent to the regions for grain procurements mechanically switched to the shock work of collectivization. Together with the people, they mechanically switched to new work and methods of the grain procurement campaign. In this way, existing mistakes and excesses were doubled and the ground was created for new ones.” The genetic relationship of both phenomena is captured here absolutely correctly. To this it should be added that reconnaissance in force, carried out for two years in a row, allowed Stalin and his entourage, firstly, to make sure that the village, in which the policy of the class approach had deepened the socio-political division, was no longer capable of unitedly as happened at the end of 1920 - beginning of 1921, to resist the radical disruption of the traditional foundations of its economic
36! Chapter XI. USSR in the context of modernization of the national economy
new life and everyday life, and, secondly, to test the readiness of their forces: the party-state apparatus, the OGPU, the Red Army and the young Soviet public, to extinguish isolated outbreaks of peasant discontent with the actions of the authorities and its individual agents. At the same time, I. Stalin managed to successfully complete the struggle with former political opponents in the ranks of the party: L. Trotsky, L. Kamenev, G. Zinoviev and their supporters, and then managed to identify new ones in the person of the so-called “right deviation”, creating certain prerequisites for their subsequent ideological and organizational defeat.
The new course of socio-economic policy of the Soviet government - this is how the actions of the Bolshevik government related to the implementation of the industrialization of the country and the gradual departure on this basis from the principles of NEP were described somewhat later by the domestic economist N. Kondratiev. This course was expressed, on the one hand, in the fact that accelerated rates of industrial development were determined, and on the other, in the fact that the self-development of industry occurred disproportionately, with clear priorities being given to the production of means of production to the detriment of the production of means of consumption. In search of the necessary capital investments, the state took the path of redistributing the country's national income by pumping a significant part of it from villages to cities, from agriculture to industry.
However, small peasant farming, on which the agricultural sector of the Russian economy was based, limited the possibilities of such transfer. This circumstance, as well as the tasks of creating a socially homogeneous and politically monolithic society, predetermined the accelerated socialization of the country's peasant agriculture. The same was demanded by the interests of strengthening the country's defense capability, especially considering the really growing threat of war. These considerations were reflected in the report of the defense sector of the USSR State Planning Committee to the country's Labor and Defense Council, devoted to the issues of taking into account defense interests in the first five-year plan. The planned significant increase in the share
§ 3. Village: “revolution from above” I 37
Socialized peasant farms were recognized in this document as a socio-economic measure that fully met the interests of the country’s defense. “There is no doubt,” the report emphasized, “that in war conditions, when maintaining regulatory capabilities is especially important, the socialized sector will be of exceptional importance. Equally important is the presence of large production units that are more easily amenable to planned influence than a large mass of small, dispersed peasant farms.”
The XV Congress of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, held in December 1927, outlined the course towards transferring scattered peasant farms to large-scale production. At the same time, it put forward the task of “further developing the offensive against the kulaks”, taking “a number of new measures limiting the development of capitalism in the countryside and leading to peasant economy towards socialism."
The policy of attack on the kulaks was expressed in the arbitrary application of increased individual taxation of the wealthy peasantry with an agricultural tax, and then a system of fixed targets for grain procurements (if these targets were not met, these targets increased several times), the forced purchase of tractors and complex machines, the seizure of land surpluses, a sharp reduction, and soon the cessation of lending and supply of this layer of the village with means of production.
This policy left a sad memory in the Russian countryside, mainly because in the tense situation of those years, the label “kulak” - “bourgeois” was often stuck on a wealthy, strong, albeit tight-fisted, working owner who, under normal conditions, was capable of feeding not only for yourself, but also for the whole country.
The largely arbitrary escalation of the fight against the kulaks increased sharply with the publication in the summer of 1929 of the resolution “On the inexpediency of admitting kulaks to the collective farms and the need for systematic work to cleanse the collective farms of kulak elements trying to corrupt the collective farms from the inside.” By this decision, many wealthy families, already subject to economic and political ostracism, were literally put in a hopeless situation and were deprived of their future. With the active support of villagers like Ignashka Sopronov, whose collective image was talentedly recreated on the pages of the novel “Eves” by Vasily Belov, a campaign was launched to purge the collective farms of kulaks,
38 I Chapter XI. USSR in the context of modernization of the national economy
than the very entry of the latter into collective farms was considered a criminal act, and the collective farms created with their participation were qualified as false collective farms. In September 1929, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars of the RSFSR supplemented the Criminal Code of the Republic with articles in which both the formation of such collective farms and assistance in their organization and activities were declared criminal offenses.
But no matter how significant the policy of attack on the kulaks was, the main vector of the new party-state course in the countryside, as subsequent events showed, reflected those decisions of the XV Congress of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, which spoke of the transfer of small peasant farming to large-scale production .
On their basis, in the spring of 1928, the People's Commissariat for Agriculture and the Kolkhoz Center of the RSFSR drew up a draft five-year plan for the collectivization of peasant farms, according to which by the end of the five-year period, i.e. by 1933, it was planned to involve 1.1 million farms in collective farms (4% of the total number in the republic). In the summer of the same year, the Union of Agricultural Cooperation Unions increased this figure to 3 million farms (12%). And in the five-year plan approved in the spring of 1929, it was planned to collectivize 4-4.5 million farms, i.e. 16-18% of their total number.
How can one explain the fact that during the year the plan figures increased several times, and their final version was four times higher than the original?
Firstly, this is due to the fact that the pace of the collective farm movement in practice turned out to be faster than initially expected: by June 1929, there were already more than a million peasant farms on collective farms, or approximately as many as was originally planned for the end of the Five-Year Plan. Secondly, the leaders of the party and state hoped to speed up the solution of the grain problem, which became especially acute in 1928-1929, by accelerating the construction of collective and state farms.
From the second half of 1929, the scale and pace of collective farm construction increased noticeably. If by the summer of 1929 there were approximately 1 million peasant households on collective farms, then by October of the same year - 1.9 million; the level of collectivization rose from 3.9 to 7.6%. The number of collective farms grew especially rapidly in the main grain-producing regions: the North Caucasus, the Lower and Middle Volga regions. Here the number of collective farmers for 4 months of 1929 (June-September) increased by 2-3 times.
§ 3. Village: “revolution from above” I 39
At the end of July 1929, the Chkalovsky district of the Middle Volga region took the initiative to declare it a region of complete collectivization. By September, 500 collective farms were created here (461 partnerships for joint cultivation of land, 34 artels and 5 communes), which included 6,441 farms (about 64% of their total number), 131 thousand hectares of land were socialized (out of 220 thousand hectares) . A similar movement arose in some other regions of the republic.
To support this movement, the department of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks for work in the countryside convened a meeting in August of the same year at which the issue of collectivization of entire districts was considered. The idea of complete collectivization of grain regions began to be put into practice. In the autumn months of 1929, commissions to promote collectivization were created under the regional, regional and district party committees. The activities of party-state and economic organizations and village institutions, political work among the masses were increasingly subordinated to the task of building collective farms. Every day the propaganda of this case in the press intensified.
Following the Middle Volga region, areas of complete collectivization began to appear in other territories and regions. In the North Caucasus, seven districts began complete collectivization almost simultaneously, in the Lower Volga - five, in the Central Black Earth Region - also five, in the Ural Region - three. Gradually, a similar movement is spreading to certain areas of the consuming band. In total, in August 1929, there were 24 districts on the territory of the RSFSR where complete collectivization was carried out. In some of them, up to 50% of peasant households were included in collective farms, but in most cases the coverage of collective farms did not exceed 15-20% of households.
At the same time, in the Lower Volga, an initiative arose that became symbolic for the entire so-called “revolution from above” to carry out complete collectivization on the scale of the entire district - Khopersky. At the end of August 1929, the district party committee decided to complete complete collectivization within a five-year period. Exactly a week later, the Collective Farm Center of the Republic, having examined the materials presented by the Khoper district on the pace and conditions of development of the collective movement, considered it necessary “to carry out complete collectivization of the entire district (to be carried out) during the current five-year plan.” Two days later, the board of this body created a commission to develop a specific collectivization plan, headed by the Kolkhoz Center instructor Baranov. Start of the party-
40 Chapter XI. USSR in the context of modernization of the national economy
Khopr's paratchiks were approved by the Bureau of the Lower Volga Regional Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, and the Council of People's Commissars of the RSFSR declared the district an experimental demonstration area for collectivization. On September 15, a month of collectivization took place in the district. As usual, about 400 workers of party, Soviet, trade union and cooperative bodies were sent to this “lighthouse” as “pushers” (as popular rumor would later call them). The result of their efforts was that by October 27 thousand households (mostly poor farm laborers) were listed on collective farms.
Such quasi-successes were achieved mainly by methods of administration and violence. Baranov was forced to admit this in a letter read out at the November 1929 Plenum of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks: “Local bodies are implementing a system of shock and campaigning,” the document emphasized. - All work on the organization took place under the slogan: “Who is more.” Locally, district directives were sometimes translated into the slogan: “Whoever does not go to the collective farm is an enemy of Soviet power.” Widespread mass work was not carried out... There were cases of broad promises of tractors and loans: “Everything will be given - go to the collective farm”... The combination of these reasons gives formally so far 60%, and maybe, while I am writing a letter, and 70% of collectivization. We have not studied the qualitative side of collective farms... Thus, there is a strong gap between quantitative growth and the qualitative organization of large-scale production. If measures are not taken immediately to strengthen the collective farms, the business may compromise itself. Collective farms will begin to fall apart.”
Thus, the Khopersky training ground for complete collectivization demonstrated firsthand the main ailments of the village “revolution from above”, which, after spreading on an all-Union scale, will receive from Stalin the name “excesses” of the general line, which he attributed exclusively to the liability of local party, Soviet and other activists who had lost their heads.
The Khoper experiment was not something out of the ordinary at that time. Similar trends, perhaps only in a less concentrated form, were observed among the pioneers of mass collectivization in other, primarily grain-growing regions of the country. On June 19, 1929, the North Caucasus Regional Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks approved the proposal of the North Ossetian Regional Executive Committee to be involved in collective farms by 1931-1932. all peasant farms. By October 10, more than a third of the collective farms in the region were already registered. The Middle Volga Regional Executive Committee stated that instead of the planned
§ 3 Village: “revolution from above” | 41
According to the plan, 5.5% by October 1, the level of collectivization in the region reached 7.5% a month earlier. In Ukraine, by October, 10.4% of households were on collective farms, compared to 5.6% in June. And in the steppe part these figures were 1.5 times higher. Undoubtedly, here, as in the Khopersky district, collective farms were often created through administrative means.
Some researchers characterize these and other facts as the collectivization race, which already in the fall of 1929 swept, along with grain, consuming and national regions, a race spurred by the desire of Stalin and his immediate circle to quickly solve not only the problem of socializing the peasant economy, but also the ongoing grain problem. It's not that simple. Firstly, the collectivization race unfolded somewhat later, and secondly, its initial geography was unnecessarily expanded by historians. Finally, there is no evidence that Stalin and his supporters spurred the collectivization process so early. But for the sake of objectivity, we will add that neither the Central Committee nor the government took appropriate measures to suppress arbitrariness and violence in collective farm construction until the spring of 1930. Moreover, even later the fight against leftist excesses was clearly inconsistent.
In order to better understand the origins and nature of collective farm euphoria, which will soon overwhelm all parts of the country’s party and state system, it is necessary to at least in general terms characterize the state of domestic socio-political thought on the issue of the fate of small peasant farming in connection with the implementation of the course towards accelerated industrialization. After the XV Congress of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, this issue, which had long worried many Russian politicians and scientists, as the wheels of the Bolshevik NEP in the second half of the 20s. stalled more and more often (until, under the conditions of the “emergency” of 1928-1929, it stopped altogether), it is moving to the forefront of the socio-economic and party-political life of Soviet society. In the ranks of the party, Stalin’s emphasis on “revolution from above” as a more painless option for solving the problem of “socialist modernization” of the countryside was opposed by the views of the leaders of the “right deviation”, who
42 I Chapter XI of the USSR in the conditions of modernization of the national economy
modern literature are called the Bukharin alternative.
Bukharin is considered one of the consistent proponents of Lenin’s views on cooperation, through which small private farms, including wealthy ones, will, as he put it, “grow into socialism.” At the same time, opinions also appeared that he allegedly “developed his own plan for the cooperative development of the village,” which largely echoes V. Lenin’s article “On Cooperation” and A. Chayanov’s book on peasant cooperation. It seems that the mentioned judgment is incorrect. After all, if Lenin and Bukharin basically had the same view of cooperation, then the non-party Chayanov understood it fundamentally differently.
Firstly, Chayanov considered the presence of a market to be a natural, normal condition for the life and activities of cooperation, while Lenin and Bukharin considered the market as a temporary phenomenon.
Secondly, Lenin and Bukharin thought of socialist cooperation in the countryside exclusively under the conditions of the dictatorship of the proletariat. As for Chayanov, he directly linked the genuine successes of peasant cooperation with the democratic regime, which should replace the dictatorial, Bolshevik order.
Its main developer is Nikolai Ivanovich Bukharin (1888-1938) -
prominent figure in the Bolshevik Party and the Soviet state, economist, philosopher, publicist. Author of the works “World Economy and Imperialism” (1915), “Economy of the Transition Period” (1920), “The Theory of Historical Materialism” (1922), “The Path to Socialism and Workers’ Peasant Union" (1925), "Notes of an Economist" (1928), "Socialist Reconstruction and the Struggle for Technology" (1931), etc. Lenin considered him the most valuable and largest theoretician of the party, although at the same time he emphasized that his theoretical views were "with great doubt can be classified as completely Marxist"
As a political figure, Bukharin showed inconsistency, rare among Bolshevik leaders, bordering on unprincipledness; in 1917-1920 he adhered to extreme leftist views; in 1928-1929 he switched to the opposite position, leading the so-called “right deviation” in the CPSU (b) After the defeat from Stalin and his team, in 1930-1936 began to praise the “leader of the peoples” and the “general line” of the party defined by him. In some foreign and domestic works on the history of Russian political Freemasonry (B Nikolaevsky, N Berberova, V Bracheva, O Platonov) there is indirect information about N. Bukharin’s involvement in this movement. And the Western researcher of the ideology of National Bolshevism M. Agursky reasonably believes that Bukharin “experienced genuine hatred for the Russian past and, perhaps, of all the leaders of the Bolshevik party, most personified the anti-national ideas of early Bolshevism.” In 1937 he was repressed. Rehabilitated in 1988
§ 3. Village: “revolution from above” 43
Bolshevik scientific adherents accused Chayanov of a neo-populist idealization of individual peasant farming, of seeking to perpetuate it. Dismissing these slander, the scientist wrote in his work “Optimal Sizes of Agricultural Enterprises” (1924): “In our deep conviction, the ideal apparatus of agricultural production is not a large latifundia or an individual farm, but a new type of economic organization, in which the organizational plan is split into a series of links, each of which is organized in those sizes that are optimal for it. In other words, we consider the ideal peasant family farm to be one that has isolated from its organizational plan all those links in which the large-scale form of production has an undoubted advantage over the small-scale one and has organized them into cooperatives at different levels of size.”
Thus, next to the peasant farm, a “large collective enterprise of the cooperative type” arose and partly replaced it. It gained the opportunity to take advantage of large-scale production where
Alexander Vasilyevich Chayanov (1888-1937) was a talented theorist and practitioner, a brilliant agronomist, teacher, science fiction writer, art historian-collector, public and government figure. The following main scientific works “Essays on the Theory of Labor Economy” (1912-1912) belong to his pen. 1913) “What is the Agrarian Question9” (1917), “Basic Ideas and Forms of Organization of Agricultural Cooperation” (1918), “Organization of Peasant Farming” (1925), “Budget Research History and Methods” (1929), as well as six stories ( among them “The Journey of My Brother Alexei to the Land of Peasant Utopia”), assessed by literary scholars as a “Russian hofmaniad”
Chayanov taught at the Petrovskaya (now Timiryazevskaya) Agricultural Academy, the People's University named after A. L. Shanyavsky, the Cooperative Institute and other educational institutions. In the last cabinet of the Provisional Government, he was a comrade of the Minister of Agriculture, participated in the work of the Main Land Committee and the League of Agrarian Reforms. Scientific works of Alexander Vasilyevich devoted to the theory of labor peasant farming, agricultural cooperation and public agronomy. He is one of the founders of the organizational and production school of domestic economic thought. Since 1919, he has been the permanent director of the Research Institute of Agricultural Economics, which he founded at the Petrovsky Agricultural Academy. He also worked in pre-revolutionary and Soviet economic bodies - representative of cooperation in the Ministry of Agriculture (1916), was a member of the Board and a member of the cooperative committee of the People's Commissariat of the RSFSR (1921-1922). In 1930 he was arrested in the case of the Central Committee of the Labor Peasant Party, since 1934 he was in exile in Alma-Ata after being re-arrested - shot Rehabilitated posthumously
44 I Chapter XI of the USSR in the conditions of modernization of the national economy
such advantages actually existed. At the same time as increasing labor productivity and raising the agricultural level, complex social problems would also be solved, since cooperation was supposed to cover and help strengthen all layers of the village.
Such “cooperative collectivization” was conceived by Professor Chayanov and his colleagues in the organizational and production direction in domestic agricultural science (A. Chelintsev, N. Makarov, A. Rybnikov, etc.) as carried out exclusively on an amateur, voluntary and purely economic basis. This, according to the scientist, was initially supposed to provide it with the properties of genuine “self-collectivization.”
Compared to Stalin’s forced breakup of independent peasant farming, which turned into a tragedy for several hundred thousand dispossessed families and the death of an even larger number of the population from the famine of 1932-1933, as well as the decline in the productive forces of the village, the implementation of Chayanov’s version of rural modernization would mean a painless, evolutionary type restructuring of the country's agricultural sector.
But the task of large-scale transfer of material and labor resources from villages to cities for the purpose of the industrial leap that the country made in the 30s was not guaranteed by this path. Moreover, under the existing political regime it was simply unfeasible. Both the scientist himself and his like-minded people were well aware of this. That is why their hopes and practical actions were aimed at, using their position as “specialists” at the relevant Soviet People’s Commissariats and institutions, to try to repeat the tactics of “envelopment” that were so successfully implemented by the Cadet-progressive opposition in relation to the tsarist autocracy before overthrow him in February 1917. A. Chayanov made corresponding proposals among his colleagues in cooperative work back during the Civil War.
“NEP's economic Brest of Bolshevism,” as the Smena-Vekhovism theorist N. Ustryalov usually called the reformist line of the Soviet leadership, gave the scientist even greater confidence in that. that the tactics of “envelopment” are much more effective than open confrontation between opposition-minded layers of the intelligentsia and the communist government. Chayanov outlined the essence of his political thoughts in a letter to a relative of his second wife, an emigrant and prominent
§ 3 Village: “revolution from above” | 45
Related information.
Modernization of a company is a process of its qualitative transformation, overcoming economic, technological and managerial backwardness, and the formation of a modern, market type of enterprise. It is both renewal and development of the company, which means the formation of their new system that meets market criteria of competitiveness, economic and social efficiency.
The fundamentals of the enterprise modernization strategy aimed at intensifying and accelerating overcoming backwardness and overcoming the crisis of the bulk of industrial enterprises are the following provisions:
The modernization strategy involves the synthesis of initiatives “from below”, from enterprises, efforts of their “self-reform” with the policy of modernizing enterprises “from above” by the state and with its direct participation, including at the expense of state resources. An effective policy for modernizing enterprises involves consolidating the efforts and resources of domestic business and the state.
The system of resource support for the modernization of enterprises includes:
Grouping of forms of resource provision, reflecting the relationship of financial and non-financial resources and their main types.
Changing the “settings” of financial and credit instruments that affect the flows of monetary and material resources that form the resource potential of modernization.
Restoration of material conditions and proportions of real capital turnover of an enterprise, and accelerated development of the domestic market for modern means of production; regulation of the proportion between financial and non-financial investments.
Low-cost forms of government support for the modernization of enterprises.
Legislative regulation of the regimes for investment use of accumulation fund resources and depreciation charges at enterprises.
Goals of enterprise modernization:
Release of new products and/or products with improved characteristics.
Increasing the efficiency of the technological equipment fleet.
Reducing the labor intensity of production processes and, as a result, optimizing the number of operating personnel.
Reducing the duration of the production cycle for manufacturing products.
Reducing losses (productive and unproductive).
Reducing the cost of the product (through the use of advanced technologies, materials, saving energy and labor resources).
The main issue in the reconstruction of production is the assessment of the expected effectiveness of the measures, which, in turn, depends on the technical and technological elaboration of the following issues:
Availability and need for modernization of units, technological lines, warehouses, tracks, etc.
Choosing a new technology or upgrading an existing one.
Selecting the composition of technological equipment.
Design and manufacture of special devices.
Enterprise modernization faces the following barriers:
The legal vulnerability of the manufacturer is manifested, in particular, in the problem of counterfeiting of enterprise trademarks by their semi-underground competitors. This practice, in addition to violating consumer rights, damages the image of the enterprise: underground workshops often produce products that are not only of low quality, but even harmful to health. In particular, raw materials of unknown origin are used, sanitary standards are not observed, and production technologies are violated. As a result, all this leads to the refusal of trade organizations that have encountered counterfeits to cooperate with this enterprise. Another aspect of the legal vulnerability of entrepreneurs lies in the general socio-political instability and the continuing popularity of anti-property sentiments in Russian society. This is also an obstacle to strategic planning and updating the production potential of enterprises.
Unfair actions of partners - non-payments, failure to fulfill obligations - determine the primitivization of the sales activities of enterprises, determine the unconditional preference for selling their products not through stores, but through markets, and the use of “black cash”.
State policy towards the manufacturer. In general, it can be stated that the state is behaving today, at least unreasonably, trying to extract the greatest income through taxes and administrative fees, thereby undermining incentives for production activity. In this case, both the entrepreneur and the state itself lose. Tax legislation today not only sharply reduces the profitability of business and thereby provokes the economy to go “into the shadows”, but also, due to its frequent changes, does not provide the opportunity to work stably.
Business efficiency is also reduced as a result of the activities of administrative bodies that control authorities. On the one hand, officials create an artificial system of prohibitions in which bribes become a condition for obtaining the necessary documents, permits, and approvals. On the other hand, the problem is the incompetence of the officials themselves, the fact that they do not have information, do not want to take responsibility, and do not monitor changes in legislation. Another tool for withdrawing funds is the system of customs duties, which increases the cost of imported production equipment by at least a third.
Thus, the lack of a favorable business environment, the responsibility for creating which lies primarily with the state, today stimulates only short-term adaptations of entrepreneurs, focused on generating income “here and now.” Entrepreneurs do not risk developing long-term development plans and, accordingly, making significant investments. Moreover, the current tax policy is not only ineffective, but it makes it impossible to conduct business without violating the law, and therefore is initially aimed at the legal vulnerability of market entities.
Underdevelopment of producer-oriented financial and credit institutions. The banking system is still focused on speculative transactions, and long-term lending for the purchase of equipment, construction or renovation of industrial premises is subject to the same repayment conditions and the same interest rates. Therefore, financing the modernization of all three enterprises is carried out without the participation of financial institutions.
Social aspects of enterprises’ activities, which include, firstly, the low price of labor in Russia, which makes investments in expensive equipment unprofitable. As long as labor is cheap, there is little economic sense in automating it. Secondly, it is still typical for city-forming enterprises to take responsibility for the well-being of not only their employees, but also the population of the city (village) as a whole. In his case, a paradoxical situation is observed: the enterprise has the opportunity to purchase additional equipment that can replace low-quality manual labor, but does not do this due to the threat of laying off a dozen workers.
The following areas of modernization of enterprises are identified:
Technical modernization: equipment. All four modernization factors mentioned above (increased competition, reduction in the raw material base, pressure from new technologies, expansion of production) are directly related to the need to introduce new equipment. There are three main channels for technical modernization that exist on the market and are available to enterprises:
Modernization through the use of Russian equipment. This method is the most common today due to its low cost: Russian equipment is purchased mainly due to the inaccessibility of Western equipment and the reluctance to carry out expensive modernization in an unstable economic situation. Domestic cars, as a rule, have weak technical characteristics and a low level of technical support. Modernizing equipment “in the Russian way” is not only about purchasing and installing it.
The use of domestic machines requires their mandatory “finishing” within 3-4 months on site, for which the enterprise creates an entire infrastructure of additional specialists and repairmen. At the same time, the entrepreneur has the opportunity not to hire permanent technical personnel, but to attract engineers and craftsmen of the enterprise for temporary, undocumented work. As a result, the enterprise receives equipment capable of performing the same functions at about 5 times cheaper.
On the other hand, the problem of adapting equipment and technologies is that it falls into a “technological trap”. The low production potential of domestic technologies is quickly exhausted.
Modernization through the use of licensed equipment. Today, a number of domestic enterprises - equipment manufacturers - have mastered the production of technologies under licenses from the world's leading manufacturers. So far, licensed technologies, although they have a lower price than Western ones and higher production characteristics than traditional domestic technologies, are less popular due to the lack of an optimal price-quality ratio.
Modernization through the use of foreign equipment. As a rule, foreign production and packaging equipment from reputable companies is the most preferable choice for an enterprise, if it has financial capabilities. Western equipment is supported, first of all, by its production and technical characteristics (quality, durability). Western companies also compare favorably with their level of warranty and service. Unlike domestic imported equipment, it is adapted using more “civilized” methods, often through direct cooperation with supplier companies.
The use of more advanced equipment also places higher demands on the quality of the workforce, which forces enterprise management to train workers and specialists. As a rule, this is done despite the costs: after all, having more trained workers, the enterprise thereby increases its “technical” and “social” capital, i.e., accumulates advantages for its leadership in the future.
Product innovation: modernization of production technologies. The structure of sales of manufactured products today also resembles the social structure of Russian society: a large volume of cheap products, which account for the main profit, and small but stable sales of expensive types of products. Often this initiates innovations of a “negative” type, i.e. primitivization rather than modernization of technology. The low purchasing power of the population is pushing enterprises to replace natural raw materials with various additives.
Of course, technology updating also concerns the development of products designed for consumers with above-average income. This is reflected in the expansion of the range of products. An enterprise often develops expensive types, often based not so much on the direct economic benefits of their production, but on “reputational” considerations of maintaining the enterprise’s brand.
The main external channel for modernizing production technologies is the introduction of R&D results from domestic specialized institutes. Direct purchases of technologies developed by domestic research institutes are carried out. In this case, we are talking about “vertical” technology transfer associated with the commercialization of the results of scientific developments. As in the case of Western equipment, the transfer of production technologies is inseparable from the improvement of the skills of their consumers.
Modernization of the marketing and sales system of enterprises. The search for unconventional solutions in this area includes, firstly, intensifying the promotion of their products, and secondly, searching for new niches in the market. The first group of activities includes conducting advertising campaigns, developing company logos and packaging design. Increasing competition forces enterprises to develop marketing departments and make a strict selection of specialists responsible for sales.
Technologies for working with personnel. A socially oriented enterprise, as a rule, is characterized by low staff turnover. A qualitatively different approach to labor organization compared to the Soviet period implies high demands on the quality of work and labor discipline, and irregular working hours. Its main principle is the efficiency of the entire enterprise, its individual divisions, and each employee. At the same time, funds are invested not in initial training, but in improving the qualifications of specialists of a sufficiently high level. Personnel turnover, which is the concern of directors, is due to the strict selection of workers, the need for them to go through a three-month probationary period, which many do not withstand: specialists - due to professional incompetence, workers - due to drunkenness and theft.
In the Russian economy, in conditions of price competition, enterprises with outdated equipment still compete with more modern ones, because even the high labor intensity of production and sales does not significantly affect the cost of the product.
Of the above barriers to modernization, internal and external ones can be distinguished.
The first two, of course, relate to internal barriers to modernization at the enterprise; the presence of at least one of them makes the modernization process impossible.
Unfortunately, in the Russian market, the vast majority of enterprises have at least one of these barriers. The rest can be attributed to external barriers to modernization. The nature of overcoming external barriers depends on the industry and region in which the organization operates.
In relation to our studied object, OJSC NK Rosneft, none of the above barriers can be an obstacle to modernization, since the enterprise is a trading company with established production and sales connections, it is an interesting borrower for banks, and government authorities provide support in the region of operation.
The CEO is clearly motivated to reorganize the company.
Let's analyze the current state of the operational non-current assets of the object under study.
Non-current assets of an enterprise include fixed assets, intangible assets, investments in unfinished capital construction, long-term financial investments in securities, long-term financial investments in the authorized capital of other enterprises, and other non-current assets.
Depreciation rate of fixed assets
IOS - the amount of depreciation of fixed assets of the enterprise as of a certain date;
The higher the wear rate, the worse the quality of fixed assets. Thus, from the coefficients we derived, it is clear that the qualitative condition of fixed assets in 2012 deteriorated compared to 2011, and at the end of the year it was acquired
new commercial equipment.
Fixed asset serviceability ratio
OSOS - the residual value of the enterprise's fixed assets as of a certain date;
PSOS is the initial cost of fixed assets of an enterprise as of a certain date.
The serviceability coefficient characterizes the proportion of the unworn part of fixed assets in the total cost of fixed assets. The suitability coefficient for the enterprise under study is quite high; the introduction of new commercial equipment gave the enterprise a good result
Serviceability coefficient of intangible assets
OSNA - the residual value of the enterprise's intangible assets as of a certain date;
PSNA is the initial cost of an enterprise's intangible assets as of a certain date.
The serviceability coefficient characterizes the share of the unworn part of intangible assets in the total value of fixed assets. In 2010, the company purchased new software; according to statistics, this intangible asset is written off within 3-5 years, or is updated periodically. The company has a software support service, which is designed to increase the service life of this intangible asset.
Consolidated serviceability ratio of operating non-current assets
OVAOS - the sum of all operational non-current assets used by the enterprise at their residual value as of a certain date;
OVAPS - the sum of all operating non-current assets used by the enterprise at their original cost as of a certain date.
Based on the analysis of the consolidated serviceability ratio of non-current assets, we also see that the acquisition of new retail equipment has improved the situation in the structure of non-current assets.
Commissioning ratio of new operating non-current assets
Renewal ratio of operating non-current assets
OVAVD - the cost of newly introduced non-current assets in the reporting period;
OVAV - the cost of retired operating non-current assets in the reporting period;
OVAK - the value of operating non-current assets at the end of the reporting period.
The entry and update ratios for the organization clearly demonstrate the company’s crisis situation in 2011 and a significant improvement in 2012.
Renewal rate of operating non-current assets
KVDOVA - coefficient of commissioning of new operating non-current assets.
The need to update operating non-current assets
OVAK - the value of used operating non-current assets at the end of the reporting period;
OVANP - the cost of operating non-current assets that do not take part in the production process at the end of the reporting period;
Planned increase in the utilization rate of operating non-current assets over time;
Planned increase in the utilization rate of operating non-current assets in terms of capacity;
The planned growth rate of product sales, expressed as a decimal fraction.
Today, it is objectively possible to distinguish four areas of modernization of the enterprise - updating equipment, developing and introducing new types of products into the range, improving the marketing system and category management, improving technologies for working with personnel. Let's look at each of the areas in more detail.
Technical modernization (equipment). The main incentive for this modernization is increased competition in the market of construction and finishing materials. At the moment, there are three channels for technical modernization on the Russian market. The most common, due to its cheapness, is modernization through the use of Russian-made equipment and is used due to the unavailability of Western equipment. There are also conditions and prerequisites for macroeconomic instability and enterprise management does not want to risk investments.
Product modernization. The structure of the market for construction and finishing materials is such that the basis for income and profit up to 80% comes from products of the middle and economy segments.
Modernization of the organization's internal environment in the field of marketing and category management. The search for unconventional solutions in this area includes intensifying the promotion of their products and companies, as well as the search for new niches in the markets.
Personnel modernization, implementation of personnel management technologies. The main directions of personnel modernization are: reducing staff turnover, improving the quality of sales personnel, which entails better customer service.
Different types of enterprises carry out modernization in different ways. Today, there are three modernization strategies: compensatory, socially limited and aggressive.
Compensatory modernization is characterized by the enterprise's orientation towards the mass market of relatively inexpensive products. At the same time, during modernization, domestic equipment is used, even sometimes simply replacing worn-out components and assemblies. It does not entail qualitative changes in the operation of the enterprise and is effective in the short term. The company achieves profit growth by increasing the physical volumes of production and sales. Product innovations are aimed at reducing the cost of the product and minimizing costs. The enterprise passively adapts to an unfavorable external environment. In general, this strategy is of an insurance nature.
A socially limited modernization strategy is typical for city-forming enterprises. Having great potential for further increasing production volumes and automating the production process, these enterprises constantly underutilize it due to marketing and social restrictions. A serious limiting factor in modernization is the status of such enterprises - the main employer bearing a social burden. Automation of production entails massive layoffs. When implementing such a strategy, profits increase not due to an increase in volumes, but due to the quality of products, for which imported equipment is purchased. In a sense, this is a containment strategy.
Aggressive modernization. This modernization strategy is characterized by a long planning horizon. The enterprise sets its own rules of behavior in the external environment - it benefits from deficiencies in legislation, corruption, unfair competition, and balances on the brink of breaking the law. Following it is possible if the enterprise has both social and technological ability, as well as the ability to attract “cheap” financial resources for a long period of time. This is the only strategy that fully realizes the potential of management modernization.
The term comes from the French word moderne, meaning “modern”, “newest”. Modernization means the process of updating in accordance with new modern requirements. Synonyms are improvement, update, upgrade.
This concept is used in relation to developments in the world, changes in the global economy and the way of life of the people of different countries, as well as to denote technical progress and improvement of production processes.
Modernization of production is the improvement of technological processes, the development and implementation of new equipment, materials, methods and methods of production, optimization of all according to modern needs.
As we know from history courses, industrial modernization is inextricably linked with the processes of reconstruction and renewal in society. With the accumulation of qualitative changes in production processes, the inevitable modernization of the economy occurs, and it entails a gradual irreversible change in the way of life and social mentality.
The concept of modernization came into use in the middle of the last century, when social scientists analyzed the stages of development of society from the traditional patriarchal structure that reigned in the 18th century, with its agricultural structure and socio-political system, to modern forms of post-industrial society with all its diversity of social relations and cultural traditions. In the 50s of the 20th century, the theory of modernization was created, which answered the question of what modernization is in relation to the processes taking place in world society.
According to this theory, modernization is a renewal of social relations, expressed in the transition from a feudal way of life to a modern industrial type. Its characteristic features:
Increased differentiation and specialization of labor;
Increased bureaucratization of production;
The emergence of socio-political institutions of a modern type;
Increasing mobility and individualism in people's minds;
Changing the cultural system (family institution, attitude towards religion, etc.).
There are three stages in the development of modernization (from the end of the 18th to the beginning of the 20th century, the first half of the 20th century and from the 70s of the twentieth century to the beginning of our century). There are two main models. This is the so-called Westernization and catch-up model.
What is “Western style” modernization (or Westernization)? This term refers to the introduction of the Western way of life, culture, and technology into the social structure of developing countries (mostly through colonization). The catch-up model relies on industrialization, with the help of which it proposes to “bring up” the level of economically backward countries to the developed ones.
Modernization theory is often criticized. The essence of the accusations basically boils down to the following - opponents of this concept argue that modernization is capable of destroying traditionally established relationships without building new ones in return, i.e. the so-called post-industrial society will not have clear mental guidelines. But it should be understood that modernization does not imply the unconditional denial and elimination of traditional values. On the contrary, in most cultures old and new traditions coexist well, which stimulates society for further development.
What is the modernization of Russian society, what is the meaning of this term in relation to our country? This issue is widely discussed not only here, but also in the world; the discussion began with the famous article “Russia, forward!” D. A. Medvedeva. The main directions of necessary changes in Russia are unconditionally recognized:
The need for technical re-equipment of production, the introduction of new computer technologies, improving the working and living conditions of Russians;
Models of society - educational reform, development and growth of private business, reduction of the state role in the economic sphere;
And building a legal society;
Reform of the social sphere aimed at improving the standard of living of citizens.