Government efforts to improve livestock breeds and yields through
selective breeding, artificial insemination, and better management
practices have also been impeded by peasant apathy. Although yields of
up to 5,500 pounds of milk per cow were obtained on some state farms in
1966 and yields of about 3,300 pounds to 3,950 pounds on the more
efficient lowland collective farms, the average yield of milk per cow
on all lowland collective farms in that year was only about 1,750 to
2,200 pounds, and a large number of upland farms obtained even less.
The latest available official Albanian livestock statistics are for the
year 1964. Data for 1965 and 1966 have been published by the Food and
Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations. The Fourth
Five-Year Plan indicates the numbers planned for some of the livestock
categories in 1970 through percentage increases expected to be attained
over the numbers in 1965. In the case of cattle, the largest increase by
far has been planned for draft oxen--60 percent as against only 12
percent for all cattle--in an effort to reduce a draft power shortage.
This increase would inevitably be at the expense of the growth in the
numbers of cows and young stock.
The growth of productive livestock herds, excluding draft animals,
lagged very substantially in relation to the increase in population, at
least through 1966. This has entailed a significant worsening of the
initially very meager supply of livestock products. According to
estimates published by the FAO, total annual meat production, including
all types of meat in terms of carcass weight but excluding edible
offals, increased from an average of 40,000 tons in the 1952-56 period
to 50,000 tons in 1967. The output in 1967 implies a per capita daily
meat availability of only about 2.5 ounces, including bones. A similar
situation prevailed with regard to dairy and poultry products because
there were only about 75 low-production cows per 1,000 population and
one head of inferior poultry per capita.
Total agricultural production, which was planned to increase at an
average annual rate of 11.5 percent or from 71 to 76 percent for the
five-year plan period as a whole, consistently fell short of the targets
in the 1966-69 period and was not likely to attain the 17-percent
increase planned for 1970. Thus, for instance, the actual output
increase achieved in 1969 was only about 10 percent as against a planned
rise of 22.1 percent and in 1968, similarly, about 1.6 as against 12
percent.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account