Ukrainian Peasants - Orientation



Ukraine is the land of the chernozem (black soil) and the breadbasket of the former Soviet Union. Because of the Ukraine's rich agricultural resources, the peasantry was the majority (75 percent) of its population prior to the Soviet Socialist Revolution. The peasantry of the Ukraine and the population in general were greatly reduced subsequently. Stalinist collectivization policies hit the Ukraine with particular force and led to the famine of the early 1930s. The population was further eroded by German occupation during World War II. Industrialization, spurred by the Ukraine's rich mineral resources, has encouraged a population shift from rural to urban areas, especially after World War II. Nonetheless, the peasantry remains an important part of Ukrainian life and constitutes approximately 50 percent of the total population. Furthermore, rural life has remained the Ukrainian ideal, both among the inhabitants of Soviet Ukraine and Ukrainians living in the diaspora. Rural life symbolizes Ukrainian identity, in part, because, prior to the Revolution, nonrural occupations were predominantly in the hands of ethnic minorities. Also, the states that held political power over the Ukraineā€”the Russian Empire and, later, the Soviet Unionā€”liked to portray it as a backward, rural area and encouraged scholarly interest in ethnography and artistic expression through bucolic themes.

Demography. Of the agricultural regions of Ukraine, the most densely populated is the central, forest-steppe region, which has the best conditions for agriculture, namely the chernozem and sufficient moisture. This has long been the most densely populated region, the highest population density being in the western part (Chernivitsi Oblast, Vinnystia, and Ternopil). The rural population is less dense in the northern belt, where conditions are swampy, and even less so in the steppe to the south (the Crimea, Kherson), where conditions are unfavorably dry.


User Contributions:

Comment about this article, ask questions, or add new information about this topic: