Area Handbook For Bulgaria Part 27

The orientation of trade toward the Soviet Union has been based largely on political factors but has also been dictated by the shortage of export goods salable in Western markets and the inadequacy of foreign exchange reserves (see ch. 10). Trade with COMECON members is conducted on the basis of bilateral clearing accounts that do not involve the use of foreign exchange. Furthermore, the Soviet Union has supplied Bulgaria with a large volume of industrial plants and equipment in exchange for the products of these plants. In the 1971-75 period trade with the Soviet Union is scheduled to increase by 60 percent over the volume in the preceding five-year period, and the share of the Soviet Union in the total trade volume is planned to reach 68 percent.

Trade with noncommunist countries rose from about 15 percent of the total volume in 1961 to 27 percent in 1966 but declined thereafter to 22 percent in 1970. From three-fourths to four-fifths of this trade was accounted for by Western industrialized nations, primarily the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany), Italy, France and Great Britain. The balance of the noncommunist trade was with developing countries, mainly India, the United Arab Republic (UAR), and Iraq. Trade with the United States has been negligible.

There has been a gradual s.h.i.+ft in exports from agricultural to industrial commodities and from raw materials to manufactured and semiprocessed products. Yet in 1970 exports of agricultural origin still const.i.tuted 55 percent of the export volume, including 8 percent of raw farm products. The share of industrial exports rose from 25 percent in 1960 to 45 percent in 1970, of which 13 and 27 percent, respectively, consisted of machinery and equipment. In 1972 the proportion of machinery and equipment in exports was reported to have risen to 34 percent.

Machinery and equipment have been exported almost exclusively to communist and developing countries. In 1968, the last year for which information was available, machinery and equipment const.i.tuted only 1.8 percent of exports to Western industrialized nations.

Imports in the 1960-70 period consisted predominantly of machinery and equipment, fuels, raw and processed industrial materials, and raw farm commodities. Imports of foods and industrial consumer goods were limited to about 10 percent per year. Machinery and equipment const.i.tuted from 40 to 44 percent of imports; fuels and industrial materials accounted for about one-third; and agricultural raw materials made up the balance.

In the 1960-70 period the country's overall trade balance was negative each year with the exception of 1969 and 1970. The trade deficit for the entire period amounted to 580 million leva, including 530 million leva in the trade with noncommunist countries and 50 million leva in the trade with communist partners. A breakdown of the trade balance by all four trading areas was available only for the 1965-70 period. For that period the overall trade deficit amounted to 278 million leva. Whereas trade with communist and developing countries had positive balances of 148 million leva and 154 million leva, trade with developed Western countries acc.u.mulated a deficit of 580 million leva. Almost all of this deficit was incurred in the years 1965 through 1967, when government controls over foreign trade were temporarily relaxed in an aborted economic reform. Under the system of bilateral agreements governing Bulgaria's trade, the surplus in the trade with communist and developing countries cannot be used to offset the deficit with Western trading partners.

Data bearing on the balance of payments have never been published. The Soviet Union has granted substantial loans to Bulgaria since 1946, some of which were used to finance imports from that country. Bulgaria, in turn, has made some loans to developing countries to help finance its exports. A portion of the deficit with Western trading partners may be offset by income from the rising Western European tourist trade, particularly with West Germany. A reputable Western source reported Bulgaria's indebtedness to Western nations to have been US$88 million in 1971, but the basis of this estimate and the degree of its reliability are not known.

CHAPTER 13

AGRICULTURE

In the spring of 1973 the country's political and governmental leaders.h.i.+p expressed serious concern about the uneven growth of agriculture over a period of several years. Although wheat production had progressed satisfactorily and reached a record level in 1972, and good results had also been obtained in the cultivation of tobacco and tomatoes--both of which are important export crops--the expansionary trend in fruit growing was reversed in 1968, and cattle raising had stagnated for at least a decade.

The situation was particularly disappointing to the leaders.h.i.+p because in 1970 it had embarked on a comprehensive long-range program for raising agricultural productivity and output through the introduction of industrial production methods on the farms. To that end the country's farms were consolidated into 170 agroindustrial complexes intended to bring the advantages of scientific organization, concentration and specialization of production, mechanization, and automation to all phases of agricultural work. Planning for these complexes has been concentrated at the highest government level, and any modification of the obligatory plans requires the approval of the Council of Ministers.

In this process the traditional distinction between state and collective property has been blurred and is slated for gradual elimination; the same is true for the differences in status of industrial and farm workers. The new approach to farm organization was taken despite severe shortages of adequately trained management and technical personnel and in the face of the demonstrated superior productivity of tiny farm plots cultivated for their own benefit by individual farm and industrial workers.

It is difficult to arrive at a comprehensive and balanced a.s.sessment of agricultural development and of the situation in the 1972/73 agricultural year because of the continuing changes in the agricultural regime and the lack of essential data. All published information, including critical comments, emanates from controlled official sources.

The press output tends to concentrate on problem areas, treating other aspects in uninformative generalities. Officials and press have been especially silent on the question of the farmers' reactions to the new agricultural order, beyond claiming the farmers' whole-hearted support for every new agricultural edict.

CLIMATE AND SOILS

Natural conditions are generally favorable for agriculture. Fertile soils and a varied climate make possible the cultivation of a wide variety of field crops, fruits, and vegetables, including warm-weather crops, such as cotton, tobacco, rice, sesame, and grapes. Frequent summer droughts, however, lead to wide fluctuations in crop yields and necessitate extensive irrigation.

The Stara Planina (literally, Old Mountain), or Balkan Mountains, divide the country into several climatic and agricultural regions. The broad Danubian tableland that lies north of these mountains has a continental climate, except for a narrow strip along the Black Sea coast. Cold winter winds sweep across the plateau from the Eurasian land ma.s.s, causing prolonged periods of frost, which tend to damage orchards and vineyards. There are 180 to 215 frost-free days in the year, and summers are hot. A continental climate also prevails in the Sofia Basin and in the region surrounding the headwaters of the Struma River.

In the Thracian Plain, south of the Stara Planina, the continental climate is modified somewhat by the influence of the Mediterranean Sea.

Compared to the Danubian plateau, winters are less severe, and summers are longer and warmer. The number of frost-free days per year ranges from 198 to 206. A near-Mediterranean climate prevails in the valleys of the lower Struma, Mesta, and Maritsa rivers; in the Arda basin; and on the southern slopes of the Rodopi (or Rhodope Mountains) (see ch. 3).

The mountains protect the inland valleys and basins from strong winds; summers there are hot, and winters are mild. Yet winters are not mild enough for the cultivation of Mediterranean crops, such as olives and citrus fruits.

The Black Sea coast is warmer than the interior of the country in winter but cooler in summer; from 241 to 260 days in the year are frost free.

Frequent gale storms and hot winds resembling the African sirocco, however, have an adverse influence on crops.

Although annual rainfall is reported to average about forty inches on the higher mountain slopes and to reach seventy-five inches in the Rila mountain range, precipitation in most farming areas averages only twenty to twenty-five inches per year. Rainfall measures even less than twenty inches in the Plovdiv area and in the coastal districts of the Dobrudzha region in the northeast. Most of the rainfall occurs in the summer months, but the amount and timing of precipitation are often unfavorable for optimum crop growth. Drought conditions reached crisis proportions in 1958 and 1963 and were serious also in 1968. In 1972 most crops were adversely affected by a spring drought and excessive rains in the early fall; the grape crop was an almost total loss.

Soils of superior and intermediate quality make up almost three-fourths of the country's surface. The Danubian plateau contains several grades of chernozem (black earth), which gradually give way to gray forest soils in the foothills of the Stara Planina. A degraded chernozem called _smolnitsa_, or pitch soil, predominates in the Thracian Plain, the Tundzha and Burgas lowlands, and the Sofia Basin. This central region is encircled at higher elevations by a belt of chestnut and brown forest soils. Similar chestnut soils are also found in the Strandzha upland, in the basins of the eastern Rodopi region, and in the Struma and Maritsa valleys. Brown forest soils and mountain meadow soils occur in the Stara Planina and in the Rila, Pirin, and western Rodopi. Alluvial soils, often of good quality, are found alongside the rivers, particularly the Danube and Maritsa, and also in several basins.

LAND USE

In 1970 agricultural land comprised almost 15 million acres, or 53 percent of the country's land area. Sixty-nine percent of the agricultural land was suitable for field crops; 4 percent consisted of meadows; and about 6 percent was devoted to vineyards, orchards, and other perennial crops. Natural pastures const.i.tuted more than 20 percent of the agricultural land. Bulgarian economists have repeatedly pointed out that the per capita acreage of farmland in the country, excluding pastures, is among the lowest in the world.

According to official statistics the area of agricultural land increased by 840,000 acres in the 1960s as a result of the expansion of grazing areas by 1.1 million acres and the simultaneous loss of 270,000 acres of cultivated land. The loss of cultivated acreage was caused by the diversion of land to industrial and other uses and by severe soil erosion. The acreage devoted to vineyards and orchards nevertheless increased by 100,000 acres, or 12 percent.

Land Protection

More than half the cultivated acreage is subject to erosion.

Increasingly large areas degraded by erosion have remained uncultivated each year, but they continue to be included in the annual statistics on farmland acreage. The unused area of plowland expanded from 720,000 acres in 1960 to 1.26 million acres in 1970. Another 1.5 million to 2 million acres have been reported to suffer from erosion to a degree that will make it necessary to abandon them unless corrective measures are quickly taken. Only 70 percent of the acreage under fruit trees and vineyards bore fruit in 1970.

The government has long been aware of the need to arrest the loss of cultivated farmland. An intensive program of reforestation has been carried on over many years, but the rate of replanting has not been high enough to halt the ravages of erosion. Proposals advanced by agricultural experts to clear abandoned mountain farmland of noxious weeds and to develop these areas into improved pastures--measures that would also help control erosion--have not been acted upon.

In 1967 the continued loss of valuable farmland led to the promulgation of a special law for the preservation of land; details of this law are not available. In 1972 the Council of Ministers issued an order, effective January 1, 1973, that provided, in part, for payments to be made into a special land improvement fund in the event of diversion of farmland for construction purposes. Depending upon the quality of the land, payments into the fund range from 162 leva (for the value of the lev--see Glossary) to 48,560 leva per acre. Land used for afforestation, cemeteries, and housing or public works under the jurisdiction of town authorities is exempt from the payment requirement. The exemption also applies to land used for open pit mining on condition that the land is rehabilitated in accordance with plans and within time limits approved by the Ministry of Agriculture and the Food Industry (hereafter referred to as the Ministry of Agriculture).

In 1970 the government created special district councils for the preservation of cultivated land and, in May 1971, placed the councils under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Agriculture. The decree of 1971 required the ministry and district governments to take decisive measures for the increased protection of farmland. The decree also directed the chief prosecutor's office to increase control over the expropriation of farmland for construction and other nonagricultural purposes and to impose severe penalties on violators of the land protection law.

The land protection measures were not sufficiently effective. The acreage abandoned in the 1966-70 period was three times larger than the area abandoned in the preceding five years. In January 1973 an inspector of the Committee for State Control stated publicly that the farmland problem had become increasingly more serious and that the committee was obliged to intervene in order to identify shortcomings in the land preservation work and to a.s.sist in eliminating the deficiencies. At the same time the Council of Ministers reprimanded a deputy minister of agriculture and the heads of two district governments for grave shortcomings in the preservation and use of farmland.

In an effort to gain control over the deteriorating farmland situation, a new land protection law that replaced the law of 1967 was pa.s.sed in March 1973. The new law explicitly provided that only land unsuitable for agricultural purposes or farmland of low productivity could be put to nonagricultural use. Under the law expansion of towns and villages was to be allowed only after a specified density of construction had been reached. Construction of country homes and resort facilities was restricted to land unsuitable for agriculture. Provision was made for regulations that would offer material and moral incentives to use unproductive land for construction purposes, and more severe penalties were prescribed for violations that result in the waste of arable land.

Irrigation

Somewhat better results have been achieved in the expansion of irrigation. In the 1965-70 period the irrigable area increased at an annual average of 44,000 acres from 2.25 million to 2.47 million acres, or 21 percent of the cultivated land. Under the Sixth Five-Year Plan (1971-75) 494,000 acres are to be added to the irrigable area, raising the total irrigable acreage to 26 percent of the cultivated land. During the first two years of the plan period 124,000 acres were equipped for irrigation, and 80,000 acres were to be made irrigable in 1973. In order to complete the five-year irrigation program on schedule, therefore, it would be necessary to bring under irrigation 270,000 acres in the last two years of the plan period--a task not likely to be accomplished in the light of past experience and of available resources.

Only about 70 percent of the irrigable acreage was actually irrigated in the 1965-70 period. Although the irrigated area of 1.7 million acres in 1970 represented an increase of 21 percent of the acreage irrigated in 1965, it was 17 percent smaller than the acreage irrigated in 1968.

Primitive gravity irrigation is practiced on about nine-tenths of the irrigated area. Water is distributed over the fields from unlined earthen ca.n.a.ls by means of furrows dug with a hoe. The work entails hard manual labor, and a single worker can handle only about 1.25 to 2.5 acres per day. The timing of the water application and the quant.i.ty of water used are not properly adjusted to the needs of the various crops, so that the increase in yields is only half as great as that obtained under optimum conditions, and about half the water is wasted. The network of irrigation ditches also impedes mechanical cultivation of the fields. Improper irrigation and drainage techniques have raised the groundwater level excessively in several districts and have caused various degrees of soil salinization in areas totaling more than 39,000 acres.

The five-year plan program for new irrigated areas calls for the construction of stationary sprinkler systems over 25,000 acres; 469,000 acres are to be provided with portable sprinkler systems. Reconstruction and modernization of existing basic facilities are to be limited to the lining of ca.n.a.ls. The ultimate longer term goal is to establish fully automated stationary sprinkler systems in most irrigated districts. The main problems in carrying out the irrigation program, in the view of an irrigation authority official, are posed by the paucity of investment funds allotted for this purpose and the contradictory nature of some of the program's aims. Additional difficulties are presented by the shortage of irrigation pipes and materials for their fabrication, inadequate experience in the manufacture of advanced irrigation equipment, and the lack of facilities for experimentation and testing.

Cropping Pattern

The area of field crops amounted to almost 9 million acres in 1970; it had declined by 887,000 acres after 1960. The proportions of this acreage devoted to the major types of crops were: grains, 62.5 percent; industrial crops, 14.6 percent; feed crops, 18.7 percent; and vegetables, potatoes, and melons, 4.2 percent. In accord with the government's policy of intensifying agricultural production, the acreage of bread grains had steadily declined, so that in 1970 it const.i.tuted somewhat less than half the total grain acreage. The area of feed grains remained fairly stable; a decline in corn acreage was virtually balanced by an increase in the acreage of barley. A slight reduction also took place in the acreage of pulses, but the area under rice expanded by 70 percent.

Whereas the total area of industrial crops changed very little in the 1960-70 period, a significant s.h.i.+ft took place in the relative size of the individual crop areas. While the acreages of oilseeds and tobacco expanded significantly, the acreages of fibers, particularly cotton, and of essential oils and medicinal plants declined sharply.

The area devoted to vegetables expanded by 20 percent. The tomato acreage expanded at about twice that rate and accounted for one-fourth of the vegetable acreage in 1970; tomatoes const.i.tute an important export crop. The potato acreage, on the other hand, declined by roughly 20 percent during the period.

The area of fodder crops suffered a substantial decline, particularly in the case of annual gra.s.ses and silage crops. The loss was only partially offset by the expansion of the perennial gra.s.s acreage.

Rapid expansion also took place in the areas of apple orchards and vineyards. The acreage of bearing apple trees increased by about 70 percent in the 1970-70 period. During the same period the acreage of producing vineyards grew by 24 percent, while the acreage of table grapes increased by 2.3 times. Fruits and grapes are also important export commodities. Expansion of the total acreage under fruit trees and berries, however, was much slower--17 percent in the 1960-68 period--and a decline in the acreage set in after 1968. In the spring of 1973 Todor Zhivkov, the communist party leader, called for decisive action to halt the unfavorable trend. He reported that plans for orchard and berry plantings were not fulfilled in 1972; that from 27,000 to 40,000 acres of orchards had been uprooted over a period of a few years; and that the vineyard acreage had declined by 25,000 acres compared with the acreage in 1968. Reasons for these developments had not been made public.

The little information available on the subject suggests that price considerations have been the major reason for the crop acreage changes.

The price system and official regulations governing farm production have not always operated in the manner planned by the government. Farms, for instance, have steadfastly refused to enlarge the acreage of irrigated corn to the extent demanded by the government, preferring to use irrigation for more profitable crops. In 1971 the farms failed to plant the prescribed acreage of feed crops or to expand the production of vegetables. Public statements by the government on the reasons for these problems have been most guarded. After a thorough review of the situation in the spring of 1972, the Committee for State Control issued a release that concluded by stating that the reasons for the problems were a.n.a.lyzed in detail and that, after discussion, specific proposals were made to the appropriate ministries.