BASIC PROBLEMS IN THE STAGE-BY-STAGE DEVELOPMENT OF THE TRANSPORT NET IN THE ZONE OF THE BAIKAL-AMUR MAINLINE

The evolution of the transport net within the BAM zone is examined in terms of three development stages. The first stage will involve the construction of the initial framework of the future transport net; aside from the BAM itself, it is recommended that consideration be given to the construction of a permanent motor road instead of the temporary construction road now envisaged. The second stage, in the author's view, should include the start of an extension of the Little BAM northward toward Yakutsk, as well as an oil pipeline (the author does not agree with the view that the BAM would replace earlier plans for a Trans-Siberian pipeline). The third stage would include a gas pipeline from the Yakutian fields to the coast; it is recommended that the gas line follow the alignment of the new railroads. No specific time frame is attached to the proposed three development stages.     

THE PHYSICAL FACTOR IN THE SYSTEM OF CONDITIONS DETERMINING THE LOCATION OF INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION IN THE USSR

The generally accepted view that material-intensive industries tend to gravitate toward raw-material sources is analyzed in the case of the USSR. Primary processing is found to gravitate toward raw-material sources mainly in underdeveloped parts of the country. In the developed zone (European USSR, Urals, Transcaucasia), a significant spatial gap has developed between primary processing activities and raw-material sources as the original local resources become depleted and the industry must draw increasingly on long-haul raw materials. Several industrial groups are distinguished in terms of the pull of resource sites. In view of the current trend toward greater concentration of production (for cost-benefit reasons) and the growing volumes of production per establishment, primary processing establishments are usually dependent on more than one resource site, and this also tends to increase the length of haul. At the same time, the distribution of fuels, energy and water resources is assuming greater significance and tends to pull such industries as iron and steel, nonferrous metals, pulp and paper as well as petroleum refining toward the eastern areas of the USSR. The controversy over the location of a new integrated iron and steel plant based on ore from the Kursk Magnetic Anomaly is recalled.     

ISSUES IN THE REGIONALIZATION OF INDUSTRY IN THE SOCIALIST COUNTRIES OF EASTERN EUROPE

A hierarchy of industrial areas in Eastern Europe is described, consisting of 40 industrial regions, about 200 industrial nodes, and numerous industrial centers and ordinary industrial places. Evidence of the formation of a higher-ranking industrial macroregion covering the border area of East Germany, Poland and Czechoslovakia is adduced. Six other entities of industrial macroregion rank are identified in the rest of Europe (including the European USSR east to the Urals).     

THE WATER ASPECT OF THE GEOGRAPHY OF AGRICULTURE IN THE USSR

The long-term grain requirements of the growing Soviet population are calculated. On the basis of the relationship between water use and grain yields by natural soil zones of the USSR, the authors show that the amount of water needed per unit of output declines with a growth of productivity, especially in the non-chernozem zone of the Soviet Union. It is therefore concluded that greater water savings might be assured by expanding grain production in zones with an adequate supply of natural moisture rather than by the use of artificial irrigation of arid lands.     

THE RULES OF THE GAME IN THE STUDY OF ANCIENT HISTORY

“The Rules of the Game,” expounded in ten remarkably bold theses, can easily be read as a synthetic retrospective or introduction to the formidable oeuvre of Arnaldo Momigliano. Indeed, this piece served as the opening chapter to his Introduzione bibliografica alla storia greca fino a Socrate (Florence: La Nuova Italia, 1975), and its subsequent reprints as an independent essay in several Italian journals and anthologies signal its importance for Momigliano. In this provocative and occasionally brilliantly witty essay, Momigliano sets forth his programmatic views on the ethos of the historian, as well as on the historical method and its applications in the study of ancient history. Here, as elsewhere, Momigliano is interested in detailing the link between ancient documents and their historical interpretations in later millennia. Ancient sources, he cautions, do not capture ancient realities transparently or completely, but are mediated documents whose historical value hinges, within certain limits, on the historian's analytical questions, inflected as they inevitably are by different ideological commitments. For this reason, he places special emphasis on the comparative method, stressing difference rather than similarity, and advises that historians with various areas of expertise collaborate, a point underscored throughout the essay. What is more, the essay contains the salutary reminder that the historian ought to attend not only to the surviving documents but also to the conspicuous silences and lacunae in the evidence.     

THE PERIODICITY OF DROUGHTS IN THE GRAIN-GROWING AREAS OF THE USSR

On the basis of a chronology of droughts in the grain-growing regions of the USSR, compiled from historical sources and the more recent period of instrumental observations, the author shows that the occurrence of drought may be regarded as a random process characterized as a quasi-stationary Poisson series of events. Most of the grain regions in the USSR follow this regularity. In the case of simultaneous drought throughout the principal grain zone of the USSR, comprising the European part and the Midland region (West Siberia and Kazakhstan), the sequence of events assumes a nonstationary character. Statistical parameters are developed for the time series of drought years and nondrought years, and are compared with extreme values in grain-yield fluctuations. Over the last 140 years, drought occurred in 76 years in at least one of the three major grain regions of the USSR (European part, West Siberia, Kazakhstan) while 64 years had no drought and corresponding normal or higher yields. A catastrophic drought affecting all three grain regions simultaneously is virtually (95%) certain to occur at least once in 20 years.     

THE NATURE OF THE MANPOWER PROBLEM IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF SIBERIA

The traditional picture of the economic development in Siberia presents a formidable obstacle in the form of a manpower deficit and high labor turnover. The official policy to combat this problem has been to give priority to the development of social and cultural amenities. Substantial changes in wage differentials and other economic and non-economic benefits seem to be a measure of the past. This article presents an overview of the situation and suggests that if any public policy is to be effective, it has to combine accelerated development in the social and cultural spheres and economic and noneconomic benefits as well. Furthermore, these measures have to be more differentiated regionally and among worker categories. Any such policy would require massive investment. The question is whether Soviet society can bear this huge burden in view of more immediate needs. Another question is whether the additional investment required would be compensated by a comparable increase in the productivity of labor. In view of substantial cost increases, capital productivity is likely to decline if not compensated by a change in the calculated prices on Siberian products, especially oil and gas, which seems doubtful in view of the present international situation.     

司机师傅,请载我去黔东南最原始的苗寨

<正>听完了风土人情后,我问司机:"司机师傅,您能带我去黔东南最原始的苗寨吗?"好啊,那就去我老家雷公山的毛坪村……"随着生活水平的提高,人们也越来越注重生活质量,工作之余,也会去风景秀丽的地方旅游,我也曾领略过很多名山大川的秀丽风景,诸如黄山、嵩山、九寨沟等等,我都被这些浑然天成