V. I.

Lenin

639

LETTER TO V. M. MOLOTOV FOR MEMBERS OF THE POLITBUREAU OF THE R.C.P.(B.) C.C. ON CREDITS TO THE SHATILOV OATS TRUST [1]

To Comrade Molotov for Politbureau members

Copy to Comrade Osinsky

Comrade Osinsky writes to me to say that the
Politbureau has cancelled all sorts of credits made available
in addition to the initial budget, and that the credits to
the Shatilov Oats Trust have also been cancelled. I have
made a point of looking into this business, and I must say that according to my information this is an
exceptionally important undertaking which must be supported by
way of exception at any cost. Unfortunately, Osinsky does
not give the figures in question. Please obtain from Osinsky,
Sokolnikov and Tsyurupa a short report, running to a few lines, about this matter by tomorrow morning, and
have another examination of this question at the
Politbureau tomorrow, summoning Osinsky to attend in the
event the data submitted by Comrades Tsyurupa and
Sokolnikov do not clear up the question entirely.

Lenin

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Notes:
[1]
Lenin believed the work of the Shatilov Oats Trust in improving
plant crops to be of great importance for the stale, because he
regarded it as a way of increasing agricultural productivity.
On the strength of Lenin’s proposal, the Politbureau of the
R.C.P.(B.) C.C., on February 18, 1922, reviewed the question
of issuing a long-term loan to the Shatilov Trust, and adopted
a decision to give it financial support. On March 4, the
Politbureau put the duly on the People’s Commissariat for Finance
to let the People’s Commissariat for Agriculture have funds for
the Shatilov Trust.

The Trust was set up on the basis of the Shatilov
Agricultural Experimental Station, founded in 1896. Today, it is the Orel
State Agricultural Experimental Station, a scientific research
establishment of the Ministry of Agriculture of the R.S.F.S.R.