Every fourth Russian would like to be a farmer.  

MOSCOW, July 2, 2010. Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VCIOM) presents the data describing which forms of agricultural management Russians consider to be most effective, whether Russians would like to buy a plot of land and what for, and whether they have a desire to take farming.

Collective farming is the most effective type of agricultural management among respondents; the share of those who support this idea has almost remained the same   (30-31%). On the contrary, less Russians consider the following types of farming to be effective: individual farms (from 34 to 27%), sovkhozs (state farms) (from 32 to 20%) and tenant farming (from 35 to 9%).    Not many Russians believe that personal subsidiary plots and private agricultural companies can be profitable (12 and 13% respectively).

Rural area citizens are in favor of sovkhozs (40%). They are supported by Russians residing in small towns (21-23%). Residents of big cities prefer individual farming (39%), private agricultural companies (22%), personal subsidiary plot (17%) or tenant farming (16%). As to metropolitan residents, two-thirds of them were hard to answer (61%).

Respondents with low financial self-assessment prefer collective forms of farming: kolkhozs (41%) and sovkhozs (22%). Russians with high financial self-assessment are in favor of individual farming (29%).

Today Russians need land to build a house, rather than for subsistence production. The share of Russians willing to build their house on their plot of land has dramatically increased over the recent twenty years (from 16 to 28%).  Currently, only 15% of respondents need land to raise agricultural products for their families, compared to 1990 when 56% of Russians said so. Those who need land  because they would like to work at dacha (8% versus 16% in 1990), keep farming (7% versus 14%), build a dacha (7% versus 14%) or get profit from selling agricultural products (7% versus 15%) are in the minority. And finally, 8% want to be a landowner for no reason. The number of those who do not want to have a plot of land at all has considerably risen from 1% to 24% over the recent twenty years.  Those who would like to build a house are generally respondents younger than 35 (38-40%) with average or high income (30-33%). The elderly respondents more often than others just prefer working on their land (13%). At the same time, those who do not want to have a land at all are dominating, as well as those with low level of income, within this age group (33 and 43% respectively).

As a rule, Russians do not want to take farming (29%, in 1990 - only 6%) or have not even thought about that (26% versus 73% in 1990). Only 26% of respondents have such a desire (in 1990 - 13%). Other 19% report they refuse to take farming due to the current situation (twenty years ago - 8%). Potential "farmers" are basically respondents with high financial income (34%) and aged 25-34 years old (34%). Those unwilling to keep farming are Russians with low level of income (34%) and elderly respondents (41%).

The initiative Russian opinion polls were conducted on January 9-10, 2010. 1600 respondents were interviewed at 140 sampling points in 42 regions of Russia. The margin of error does not exceed 3.4%.

Note: Using materials from the site www.wciom.ru or wciom.com, as well as distributed by VCIOM, the reference to the source (or hyperlink for the electronic media) is obligatory!