A plan to relieve the economic situation of the declassed in 27 small towns in the regions of Minsk. Mozir, Vitebsk, Homel and Bobruisk was today approved by the White Russian Sovnarkom. By this plan 6,000 Jewish families will be placed in productive labor.
According to the plan, a large number of collective farms will be established under government supervision and with government assistance. These farms will be in the vicinity of the small towns. Artisan cooperatives will also be created within the towns. Work in 18 of these towns has already been started, and in 9 more it will begin soon. It is planned that all organizational work will be accomplished within the year.
A condition imposed is that those desiring to settle on the farms must enter the collectives.
Independent of the general five-year amelioration plan of the Ukrainian government, which did not include the small towns populated principally by Jews, the Ukrainian Comzet, governmental department for Jewish land settlement, has decided that 11,000 land workers’ farm units must be established in the neighborhood of the small towns of the Ukraine for the declassed within the next five years. The Comzet is considering the establishment of these cooperatives on the right side of the Dnieper.
However, sufficient land is not available there. The Comzet recommended that the government assign only 18,000 hectares for the 11,000 settlements planned. Even such an amount of land is unavailable in the Ukraine, it was stated. Under the circumstances, the feasibility of the Comzet plan is doubted.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
