Page:Karl Kautsky - Georgia - tr. Henry James Stenning (1921).pdf/27

 In the Thirteenth Century the population of Transcaucasia was estimated to be sixteen millions. To-day it amounts to hardly one-third of this number.

But even this third does not find sufficient support in its own country. Georgia required constant imports of corn, which it could easily receive from neighbouring South Russia. These imports were paid for with tobacco and wine, which are produced in abundance in Georgia. The Russian Government encouraged this commerce, which was to the interest of the great wheat growers, who found in Georgia a market close at hand for their surplus corn, and received cheap wine and tobacco in exchange. If not for the cultivation of wheat, the Russian Government has done much to promote the culture of the vine in Georgia, and, in addition, has aided the production of tea. The vine, tea, olives, and almonds are in, many parts carefully cultivated. The remarks upon the backwardness of agriculture do not apply to these crops. Nevertheless, owing to the primitive character of its agriculture, an agrarian country like Georgia was not a little dependent upon a foreign market for its sustenance.

War and revolution would, therefore, menace the country in the extreme. Bolshevism has cut off Georgia from the corn granaries of South Russia, and deprived the country of the markets for its surplus products. At the same time the aftermath of the war has rendered it extremely difficult for Georgia to find new markets in Western Europe, and fresh corn providers in America and Australia. This explains the food difficulties which we find in a country so richly dowered by nature, and in which over eighty per cent, of the population live by agriculture.

In addition to the backwardness of the mode of production, another circumstance contributed to diminish the yield of agriculture, by decreasing the amount of labour power which was engaged in it.

This factor is malaria, which in the most fruitful districts is a scourge to the country, and paralyses the