Every time I hear curses against the USSR and its politicians, I want to ask those cursing: gentlemen, what would your parents, grandfathers and grandmothers eat, if not they,
For some reason, there is an opinion that the revolutionaries tried, if not to starve half of the population, then to accustom the people there is tasteless muck Although in fact, the Soviet government after the revolution was faced with the task of feeding the country - all.
I know, they won't believe me, but in the Russian Empire, which is now remembered with such longing, the production of goods in the food group was... at an artisanal, for the most part, level. Only the privileged strata of the population had access to the simplest delicacies - ice cream, for example. And there was no question of the worker drinking not even good, but the cheapest grape wine, despite all the efforts of Lev Golitsyn, who believed that a working person should not drink muck, but grape wine.
I very, very much doubt that the autocracy would have bothered to feed the electorate. Unless there was absolutely nothing to sell abroad (grain export was not due to surpluses, but due to the fact that the peasantry - that is, the grain producers, had almost no left of it, white bread was for them delicacy).
Anastas Mikoyan made a huge contribution to “feeding the country”. He was an amazingly talented person, and he approached the matter very responsibly. Work on uniting the food industries into a single department began in the second half of the 1920s, and in the fall of 1930. it was completed and there was a separation into a separate sphere, which was included in the People's Commissariat of Supply.
It had to be built literally from scratch - there were only two scientific institutes serving the food industry (general and sugar industries) and three faculties for the training of food engineers. Therefore, when they say that our food industry is "borrowed", many ideas are brought from the USA, then... But what to do? Coming up with something already invented?
August 24, 1930 Mikoyan's deputy for the People's Commissariat of Trade A. A. Kissin wrote to V. M. Molotov:
- After the concentration of the food industry, NKTorg for the first time raised the issue of broadly attracting foreign technical assistance. Comrade Mikoyan approved a plan to attract 75 foreign engineers from abroad, specialists in various fields. About half of this number... will live in Moscow. They will work in the now created design bureaus for the food industry, as well as in the apparatuses of the food association. industry... Without the involvement of foreign specialists, it will be absolutely impossible to timely develop technically competent projects for the construction of new food factories ...
Thanks to Mikoyan's vigorous activity, large-scale construction of food enterprises was launched in the years of the first five-year plan, and this was the first step towards a normal food industry.
The canning industry - it appeared thanks to Anastas, who achieved "good" from Stalin for its deployment in 31.
- To approve the program for the production of canned meat and fish presented by the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs, bringing the production of canned meat to 700 million cans in 1933, and up to 610 million cans of fish cans. - I read a point in one of the resolutions he had prepared. And you know, the decisions were carried out then.
Mikoyan revived destroyed industries and created new ones. Canning, margarine, mayonnaise, vitamin and many others appeared thanks to him. Brief information: it was he who achieved the release of the polio vaccine in the form of pills.
And the fact that in 1935 they were able to abolish the rationing system is largely the merit of this person. By 1936 17 large meat factories, 8 bacon factories, 10 new sugar factories, 41 canning factories, 37 large refrigerators were built and put into operation, 205 mechanized butter factories, 9 confectionery factories, 33 dairy factories, 11 margarine factories, 178 bread factories, 22 tea factories and many other enterprises. According to some indicators of the total volume of production (for example, for beet sugar), the Soviet Union climbed to the first place in the world. In 1936 g. beet sugar produced 130 mln. Tons (Germany - 91.8 million tons, France - 67, USA - 93).
By 1940 280 bakeries were commissioned, which produced about 60% of all grain products in the country. Thanks to Mikoyan, the country received semi-finished products (so every time you eat cutlets, whether the dumplings are purchased, but whatever - you are eating a product, to the creation of which "delicious People's Commissar ". Yes, the quality in those days was many times better - he followed it. And not a single product was put into production before it got approval from Mikoyan.
It is still necessary to look for such talented leaders as he is. So, to be honest, you can write: in the USSR, thanks to his work, ALL products that were on the shelves appeared.
But people do not remember everything. However, this “not all” is also a lot.
• Ice cream - thanks to Mikoyan.
• Juices - thanks to Mikoyan
• Canned food - thanks to Mikoyan
• Sausages and smoked meats - thanks to Mikoyan
• "Soviet Champagne" - thanks to Mikoyan
• Semi-finished products - thanks to Mikoyan.
• Mayonnaise and other sauces - thanks to Mikoyan.
• Even condensed milk - and then thanks to the "tasty People's Commissar"
• And also crabs (“everyone should try how tasty and tender crabs are”)
And I simply cannot list all the products.
So there is no need to devalue the memory of people who literally created the history of modern cooking out of nothing. They deserve fond memory and a low bow.