SLOW PROGRESS MADE IN MECHANIZATION OF SOVIET PEAT INDUSTRY

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80-00809A000700010159-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: C
• Document Page Count: 4
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 20, 2011
• Sequence Number: 159
• Publication Date: September 8, 1951
• Content Type: REPORT

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REPORT
CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY
INFORMATION FROM
FOREIGN DOCUMENTS OR RADIO BROADCASTS CD NO.
CLASSIFICATION CONFIDE TIAL
COUNTRY USSR
SUBJECT Economic - Peat industry
HOW
PUBLISHED
WHERE
PUBLISHED
DATE
PUBLISHED
LANGUAGE
Monthly periodicals
Moscow
Apr 1951
OI S[A MI NIGD T! it SPIO NAGN OAOIN\0
STN[ 0 CONUW
STATES IYITO.IIMA TM[
O P TE? PERSON ISA 'NO
F ITS CO XTEN 11. Al ANYSSANN[P TOT SA NP UXAUTMO
MI [ITID SY LA'S. P\I0.0DUCTI0. OF THIS FOPS IS PNONISITEO. ,
Periodicals as indicated.
INFORMATION 1951
DATE OF
DATE GIST. C Sep 1951
NO. OF PAGES 4
SUPPLEMENT TO
REPORT NO.
THIS IS UNEVALUATED INFORMATION
SLOW PROGRESS MADE IN MECHANIZATION
OF SOVIET PEAT INDUSTRY
Information contained iissthis ues of reportIrfywas ex
articles in the April 1951
Mekhanizatsi a Trudoyemkikh i T azhel kh Rabot.
The Soviet peat industry, which showed
at production increaselof 58 mercentz-
ingipg the uctproess Pldu, paid 1940-50, particularly from 1946 to 1950.
Some om peat-production successes have have processes been aachhieved , during but certain parts of the industry remain ex-
ceedingly backward. This is evidenced by the wide range prosroduction inctionpindesexes
between peat enterprises of various ministries and among inr
within a ministry.
The peat enterprises of the Ministry of Local Fuel Industry RSFSR have a
low level of mechanization: in 1950, 75 percent of the peat was extracted by
ofredominaut
elevator and manual cutting methods.NomechInized methods also
in peat enterprises of the Ministry of Light Industry USSR, Ministry of Local Fuel Industry Ukrainian
nfSLR, anlnseveralUother
ministries. In 1950, peat enterprises of the Ministry uct at
using the excavator method had mechanized pet extractiond47.5wpInden mecehanized
enter-
gathering t percent, peat loading 1.9 percent; c at all. At present, 6.5 percent of the peat is still ofnLocal Fnelilndustry
prises of this ministry. Enterprises of the Ministry 5 RSFSR produced 73 percent of their peat bylsemimechanizednmethods aande23.5 per-
cent by manual cutting, while spreading loading chani.
Maa,y ministries pay little attention tomechanseizcondarying since
they consider peat extraction an unimportant
There are several reasons for the lack of mechanization in these ministries:
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1. The ministries' machine-building plants are not filling the peat enter-
prise requirements. Meanwhile some ministries, such as the Minisesa of Lo cal
Fuel Industry RSFSR, Ukrainian SSR, and Beio:ussian SSR, have plants P
filling not only the requirements of their own enterprises but also those of
other ministries wh'_ch do not have their own machine-building plant.
2. Many enterprises do not fully utilize their e:achineF and continue to do
secondary operations manually.
3. Scientific research institutes of the peat industry have not produced
the proper machinery for some production processes. Forrixample, nterprithe
needs machines for gathering or loading p
for drying peat at electrified enterprises.
4. Some peat enterprises, including many of the Ministry of Electric Power
Stations, employ too many workers both for productional and nonproductional labor,
tpe productivityP,
thus retarding otherwise probable increases in~labor
average production per yearly worker during 1950 at
Sinyavinskiy peat enterprises of the Ministry of Electric Power Stations was 489,
382, 346, and 337 tons, respectively, while the completely mechanized Tootsi Peat
Enterprise of the Ministry of Chemical and Shale Industry, Estonian tSSR, produces
an average of 600 tons per worker or as much as 932 per
the peat industry's mechanization, program, the peat-production methods
which best lent themselves to mechanization were stressedeExperimentsawererusts.
carried out at neat experimental stations and in many peat
The milled peat method proved most suitable for mechanization, the elevator method
the least. As a result, utilization of the elevator method for peat extraction
dropped from 30.1 percent of the total production in 1940 to 20,6 percent in 1950
ise of
tofstherexcavator
and manual cutting decreased from 18.8tof11.4 percent, whereas
method increased from 3 to 16.7 percent percent.
and the milled-peat method increased from 16 to 23,2 Prod
Secondary operations of the peat enterprises also showed some increasesnin
mechanization. Excavation work was mechanized 68.2 percent in 1950, and against
51.3 percent in 1940; Trying peat 22.2 percent, as against 11.6 percent;
ing peat 48 percent, as against 12.8 percent.
While the most effective peat-extraction methods were being selected and
tried, the machines which determined these methods were undergoing development
and trial. Many new machines -ere developed during the Fourth Five-Year Plan:
FK-4 and FD-4a drum milling machines, VMF turning machines, VUF piling machines,
UMPF??4 gathering machines, OF-3 storing machines, TEMP and VEP peat-excavating
machines, TE-2 and E-351 excavators fiel othersand secondary operations,
electric spreader machines, drain-digging l and .
The milled peat gathering machine required and received priority treatment
suc-
during the Fourth Five-Year Plan and the standard UMPF-4 gathering machine was rove developed for this difficult operation. Although
rththis
sedahine pd vedtquiteosui
produced
cessful, the more recent FTK gathering mp"hine,
Peat Enterprise, has proven superior in a series ofU conductedpeatat
enterprise. Moreovfr, the recently tested (1950)
proven more effective than the UMPF-4, arid, therefore, will probably take its
place. This machine eliminates the turning, piling, and storing operations and
produces peat with a lower moisture content and a better texture. of El Glavtorf (Main Administration of the Peat Industry) of the Ministryfof Elec-
tric Power Stations, which completed its 1946 - 1950 Plan 100.7 p
peat had inltherfollowing atable.
Cf F tyiI".!.
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;d anization of Pea; Industry
l
Milled Excavator Elevator Manually
MMethod Method _ Method Cut
0 30.1 18.8
USSR peat industry 1940 16 0 3. 11..4
232 167 20.,6
USSR peat industry 1950 1( B
Glavtorf, 1940 None
63 -- 1,7
Glavtorf, 190
In Glavtorf, over 98 percent of all peat produced in 1950 was obtained by
, dredge, and hydropeat methods as against 92 percent in 1940,. Use
the f milled, dredge,
production method, which is the most time
of the elevator prod -cons e7rcentfith1950f
was decreased from 7 8 percent in 1940 to 1.7 p
and no peat was cut manually. The most significant increase was the one made in
extracting peat by the milled peat method- Many new-type machines were developed
for this method, making it possible to increase its relative importance from 3.6
percent of the total production in 1940 to 63 percent in 1950 The first milled
0,
peat enterpri ses of Glavtorf reached complete mechanization in 1949. In 1 95
there were 18 such enterprises and in 1951 it is planned to mechanize an additional
33 enterprises. Labc- productivity in the above enterprises is 1.5 to 2 times
of the Ministry of Electric Power Stations as a
higher tuan in peat enterprises
whole.
VNIITP (A11-Union Scientific Research institute of PeatnIndustry) recFiveeived
large sums for the purpose of developing peat
Year Plan. Twenty-six percent of these funds were usedvtoodevelop hydropeat methods, 12
methods, 22 percent milled peat methods, 8 ps r
percent artificial dehydration of peat, 8 percent on heat and mechanical treat-
ment of peat, 8 percent for perfecting loading and transporting peat, 8 percent
research on preparing peat daposits, and 14 percent for other work.
Llthough the institute has accomplished much, it has not yet answered some
important problems satisfactorily. For examplu a mechanized h detdryiainn p perroedcesss mer
s for
lump peat, an uninterrupted process for dehydrating p e, roem
laying and relaying track, and other problems are outstanding, The latter p
VNIITPwalcO gave li
was somewhat taken operati nyinntheiruown machinesshopsa trusts
machinery er phins op
help in in developing m2ans of artificial dehydration and problems ,:oncerning economies
of production were not satisfactorily worked out. possible for Glavtorf
The increase in mechanization during 1946 - 1950 made it pto increase peat production 27.5 percent and to cut down on the number f averag
y ger,
16,000, thus increasing output per worker 50.4 percent
for tool
early workers ty om,lete its 1950 plan for prouucing peat. Its plan
peavtexf did not aomp percent., The out-
peat er 'Worker reached 96.2 per95n8 percent, and?therproduction 8cost of peat was 6.5
put per higher thanhpd only 95.8 p percent of the plan for mechanized ggutneerring
of lump
percent higher than planned., Eighty
of milled. peat was fulfilled, and the plan for semimechanized gathering and Kirov
pert was only 42.8 percent completed, The Yaroslavl , Ivanov, Kaliny
peat trusts were the worst offenders, the Ki'?ov Trust completing only 50.4 W
of its plan for finished peat, 9nd the Yaroslavl, T rust one 5Podo66 Two Peat
individual peat enterprises had especially
Enterprise completed only 39.6 percent of its plan, the Zenginskiy,Enterprise only
14.9 percent.
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This poor showing in 1950 was partly due to poor weather conditions but more
to the poor preparation for peat season, poor work Several?ccor.structioniandfinstalla-
tio of existing ma moc
tion administrations ns of 3lavtorfostroy were also responsible fc,r the nonfulfill-
ment of the 1950 plan. They did not prepare milled peat fields for the peat enter-
prises as called for by the 1950 plan. For example, the const.uction organizations
of the Zenginskiy Peat Enterprise (former chief, Ageyev) prepared only 32.5 percent
of its fields in 1950; those of the Chisto-Borskiy enterprise (former
ov
Matskevich), 30 percent; and those of the Pel'gorskiy enterprise (chief, efpP ),
30.9 percent.
The Kuznetsk Flant of Glavtorfmash was responsible for the peat industry not
completing its 1950 year plan for gathering lump peat because it did not supply
the industry with the much-needed UkB gathering machines.
The Yaroslavl', Ivanov, Kalinin, and Kirov Peat trusts were sharply criticized fallin by a collegium of the Ministry of the Electric behind for fallinggso far
behind the 1950 plan. Some trusts are lagging erd
fields for the 1951 season.
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