Russian Women Seek to Improve Rural Community Life

by Natalia Scribunova

"So long as women remain detached from what is going on, all efforts to improve the public welfare will be in vain." -N. Dolgova, early Russian feminist, in her book, Woman's Role in Agriculture, published in 1902.

The decline of Russia's agricultural system has meant not only a decline in food production but the deterioration of rural communities. The social service network as it existed before privatization simply no longer exists. Roads, schools and hospitals, which formerly belonged to collective farms, are now the property of local municipalities, which have no financing to maintain them. Approximately 70 percent of rural communities have no running water or sewage systems, nearly half have no gas, electricity or medical facilities, and nearly a third have no stores.

Children's education has also been impacted. The network of nursery schools has been sharply reduced and many schools need major repairs. In former times, there was usually one school shared by several nearby villages. Since children were brought to the school daily on a bus that was paid for by the state farm, there was no need to build schools in each community. Now, hardly any farms have funds to pay for the bus, and farmers who live in outlying areas can't drive the children to school and back every day. Children are also an important source of seasonal labor, and many of them can't attend school in the spring or fall. Situations arise where some children simply do not attend school at all.

However, land reforms are giving rural people the chance to own their own land and stronger motivation to improve their communities. Despite their small numbers, private farmers are catalysts for social change in Russian villages, and women in particular are taking the lead to improve the social fabric of their communities. By some estimates, women own 30 percent of private farms in Russia.

The first organization of rural women in Russia was created in 1897, during the heyday of the Russian feminist movement. The women organized to fight for the right to obtain a degree in agricultural studies, which was not possible at that time. The movement enjoyed high-level support from members of the tsar's family and the Russian Academy of Sciences.

In those days, field work was done by village communes, and women were responsible for village life: educating children, organizing festivals and preserving cultural traditions. With the disappearance of private land ownership, there was no need to keep up the village commune and the role of women became less important.

Women's labor was valued according to their contribution to agricultural output. While women in rural communities worked as teachers, doctors and economists, these professions were the least paid and least prestigious in rural areas. The value of women's contribution to rural life decreased and led them to stop seeking new responsibilities. However, the revival of the right to own property has led women to reexamine their roles in the community and search for ways to contribute.

Rural women in Russia united for a second time in 1996 when they created the Interregional Movement of Rural Women (IMRW). Its objective is protecting the right to private land ownership. The movement unites women from 51 of Russia's 89 oblasts. Although it began as the women's division of the National Association of Farmers, and had only farmers as members, later the group decided to involve all rural women. The group became independent in 1996, but still works closely with its parent organization.

The movement's "ground-up" organization allows it to remain abreast of the most pressing issues and to develop programs that meet the needs of rural women in each oblast. A chairman and coordinating council bear responsibility for ensuring that the IMWR has the financial and organizational resources to carry out its programs and to lobby the authorities. At the same time, the movement's local branches work to resolve specific problems that women are experiencing in their oblasts. The movement's primary programs involve medicine, alternative education, children and assistance for women farmers.

Part of the children's program involved placing orphans with 300 farm families in the Krasnodar Region. Russia currently has an unprecedented number of homeless children, and the underlying idea of placing children in farmers' homes was to give them a place to put down roots and to prevent them from becoming cut off from society. Giving the children ownership of plots of land was an important part of implementing this idea.

Members also work to set up camps for rural children, with mixed success. An attempt to create a camp for Bryansk area children, who had suffered from the Chernobyl catastrophe, failed because of high taxes. But farmers in the Novgorod Region opened an art studio for local children and have organized touring shows of the children's drawings. The women support any initiatives that allow their children to expand their world beyond the bounds of their own farm.

The Novgorod IMRW also arranged for free medical check-ups for women and children by Moscow doctors from the Broken Flower Foundation. The doctors have agreed to conduct the check-ups for free, and the farmers are willing to pay the doctors' travel expenses, but neither the Ministry of Health nor the Ministry of Social Welfare was able to provide the specially equipped bus required for the program. The IMRW is currently working to resolve the bus problem, as well as to set up a mobile dental clinic.

One of the movement's priorities is professional assistance to women farmers. Both on its own and with the assistance of the Association of Farmers, the women's movement organizes exchange programs with women farmers from other countries and brings in consultants to work directly with farms headed by women. In some cities, schools have been created to teach rural women agricultural and farm management techniques. The IMRW is now creating a Women's Bank that would provide targeted credits to women entrepreneurs in agriculture.

The agrarian reforms that have occurred in Russia over the past five years have completely neglected the ecological and social needs of rural communities, despite political declarations to the contrary. This one-sided economic view of reforms has created enormous social and environmental problems, and pricing policies have created a financial crisis for agricultural producers.

Environmental and social problems in rural communities can be traced to lack of education on sustainable techniques, resulting in farmers' need to use resource-intensive techniques to stay in business. Unfair distribution of production resources and lack of access to processing facilities has prevented farmers from realizing their full potential and has created a national food security problem.

Despite all these problems, the private farming movement is the leading force for positive change in rural communities. Rural women can play a unique role in creating specific programs to develop rural communities and build civil society. Nongovernmental organizations will play a critical role in supporting these innovative movements until such time as their achievements are recognized and supported by the government.

Natalia Scribunova is director of the Center for Citizen Initiatives' agriculture project in Moscow. Translated by Andrew Reese.

Center for Citizen Initiatives, 3268 Sacramento Street, San Francisco, CA 94116; phone (415) 346-1875, fax: (415) 346-3731; e-mail: timchik@cat.glasnet.ru