Introduction

Ever since the emergence of collectivization, the development of agriculture in socialist countries has been of great interest to economists. The recent increase in food purchases by socialist countries in the international market has heightened this interest. Over the past 30 years, several events have attracted attention: the communal movement in China during the late 1950s, the economic reform in the East European countries in the 1960s, the food crisis in Poland during the second half of the 1970s. All of these marked different stages of development and reflected the diversity of economic organization in socialist agriculture. In particular, the productive efficiency of socialist agriculture has concerned economists.