Crimea Government Makes Public Results of Survey for Jewish Colonization

Whether or not the Jewish colonization work in Crimea, insofar as it has been conducted by Russian agencies, has been developed under a method of efficiency, constitutes a sharp difference of opinion between the government of Crimea and the central Soviet agency dealing with the problem.

The Soviet press published today the result of an investigation conducted by the Crimea government into the present status of the Jewish colonization work in Crimea. The report shows that up to August 1928, 100,000 hectares, of the 133,609 hectares of land allotted for this purpose, had been settled. The rest will be settled during 1928-29. Four thousand seven hundred and sixty seven Jewish families have already registered as candidates for settling on the land.

The report criticizes the Commissar at Agriculture in the Crimean government for his “failure to direct properly the work of the Jewish colonization.” The Comzet, the Moscow central agency dealing with the Jewish colonization work throughout Russia, comes in for a lashing in the report which charges that the Comzet’s work was in efficient. The plans were deficient, the settlers’ houses were costly and poorly built, it charges. The Ozet, the society for settling Jews on the land, is similarly charged with inefficiency in the report. During the past year the Ozet lost 25,800 roubles on sheep raising, it is declared.

The report also directs a sharp rebuke to Assistant Agricultural Commissar Adler and to the Comzet representative in Crimea, Friedman.

At a meeting of the Executive Committee of the Comzet held here yesterday, disagreement was expressed with the conclusions of the Crimean government’s survey. A resolution was adopted requesting the Soviet government to order a special investigation by the Finance Commissariat in cooperation with the Workers and Peasants Control Commission in U. S. S. R.