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The role played by agro-recreational activities in the formation of an integral rural-urban environment
00167185/91 $3.00+0.00 @ 1991 Pergamon Press plc
Geoforum, Vol. 22. No. 1. pp. 9!%103. 1991 Printed in Great Britain
The Role Played by Agro-recreational Activities in the Formation of an Integral Rural-Urban Environment
B. S. ZHIKHAREVICH
Abstract: Using the city region of Leningrad as the basis for research, an analysis of those processes leading to the integration of city and countryside is undertaken. The focus of the investigation is on what are termed ‘agro-recreational activities’, which embrace the collective gardening and associated recreational activities of city dwellers which take place in rural areas close to the city. Such activities have a growing recreational significance for the inhabitants of big cities and make an important contribution to the local production of fruit and vegetables. Questionnaire surveys of urban residents and collective gardeners reveal the present-day leisure patterns of gardeners and the unmet demand for various kinds of agro-recreational activity. Transportational and other types of infrastructural improvement may ultimately lead to the formation of agro-recreational complexes and systems which will balance productive and recreational activities at various scales and levels, and further enhance rural-urban integration.
Processes of Integration Country
between
side is increasing together with the number of feaelements of sotures common to both as structural ciety as a whole, whereas at the base level production and non-production ties between individual economic enterprises as well as resource and infrastructural subsystems of specific towns and villages are being strengthened and intensified.
Town and
tendency to integrate has now become a predominant force in the territorial organization of society. It can best be seen in local township systems at the regional level, where the most advanced of the present-day forms of combined productionand lifeenvironmental sociosustaining systems-the economic complex-is being developed.’ One of the key aspects of this process lies in overcoming the mutual isolation of the city and the countryside as subsystems of society, in increasing their interaction, and, in a number of cases, in their structural fusion and the establishment of a new integral entity which can be achieved as a result of the productive and socio-economic integration of town and country.
The
The concept of the productive integration of town and country
Integration presupposes mutual changes involving the innermost structures of the objects undergoing integration, without which a new entity cannot emerge. There are three possible ways for such an entity to be formed, theoretically distinguishable and integrative to various degrees. The first one is the absorption by a leading partner of the other partner, the complete drawing of the latter into the former’s orbit, its dissolution. In this way the city absorbs nearby villages, turning them first into ‘sleeping compartments’, the outskirts of the city, and then drawing them within its borders. In all this the structural changes in the leading partner are insignificant, they have no essential value, and the integrative tendency of the process itself is expressed weakly and in a very limited form.
and socio-economic involves the whole
array of processes taking place at different levels of socialist society, when at its superstructural level the interdependence between the city and the country99
100 The second way involves the mutual exchange of essential characteristics and the acquisition of new ones, common to both parties involved in the integration process, as a result of which the parties become alike, indistinguishable, homogeneous. This takes place, for instance, when processes typical of urban housing construction are spread into the rural areas together with city life patterns and the devetopment of non-agrarian activities. In this case the countryside loses its essential characteristics and disappears as a counterpart in the ‘town vs country’ dichotomy. This kind of integration (on the basis of a rapprochement) means, on the one hand, a certain levelling of differences, a loss of originality and an increase in entropy. However, on the other hand, there is a compensatory increase in fruitful diversity as well. Thus, the rapprochement between the city and the countryside in types and degrees of production concentration and in labour conditions is accompanied by the preservation and deepening of differences in specific natural parameters, in functions performed, etc. The number and choice of professional occupations and other jobs grows on account of the supplementing of traditional city and countryside jobs with new ones, both rural-urban and agroindustrial. The third way-properly integrative in the narrow sense-lies in deepening the differences in essence and in functions to such an extent that each of the parties in the integration process can no longer exist isolated of the other one; a new system emerges, including in itself formerly independent objects now inseparably joined as functional subsystems indissoluble from the whole. In reality the above-mentioned ways of forming an integral rural-urban environment are intertwined, sometimes contradicting one another, but they steadily transform the local environment. Hence the rapprochement between, and the integration of the city and the countryside are determined not only by the processes operative in the production sphere and the productive forces (such as the industrialization of agriculture, establishment of agroindustrial complexes, and so on) but by those processes which reflect integrative tendencies in people’s mode of settlement and their leisure activities. Thus, a very significant interaction between the city and the country is brought forth by the recreational activities of the city-dwellers.
Geoforum/Volume Rural-Urban Activities
Integration
22 Number l/l991
and Agro-recreational
Satisfaction of the townfolk’s demand for out-oftown Ieisure opportunities and a second home in the countryside is one of the most pressing problems of big cities in the U.S.S.R. It can never be solved without taking into account both the countryside adjacent to a big city and that more distant. This demand is developing alongside a growth in the number of cities and in their sizes and has reached a very large scale at present. The desire to possess a second home is caused by increases in standards of living, the growth in the amount of spare time. higher levels of motorization, the unfavourable ecological situation and the housing deficiency in towns, the comparative ageing of the population, and related problems of work and leisure for the retired. By the ‘second home’ are meant dwellings usually located out of town and intended not for permanent residence but for individual and family leisure. The principal types of second home in the U.S.S.R. are the following: (a) private country cottages (dachas) and those in dacha-building co-operatives. (b) stateowned country cottages leased to certain categories of citizens and to organizations, (c) rest and recreation homes planned as settlements made up of individual cottages and belonging to an organization which lets them to its personnel, (d) rooms rented from the local population, (e) cottages in the gardening communities of workers belonging to their members, and (f) houses in villages. As to the form of property, all the above types are divided into two categories. The first one, comprising dacha cottages and garden community cottages, endows the owners with every right of possession, disposal and use, together with related duties. This kind of residence makes up not less than half of the total number of second homes. The second homes in the other category are leased to individuals or groups for a stipulated term and may not be sold or otherwise disposed of. Some of them are state property, the rest are collectively or privately owned by landlords who lease them out. According to the type of settlement, second homes can be subdivided into those grouped in specific seasonal residential areas (dacha settlements. collective gardening communities) and those incorporated within an established permanent, rural or urban settlement. Gardening plots in collective gardening communities
GeoforumNolume
22 Number l/1991
now represent the type of second home most easily affordable by the population, as well as most useful to society. This is explained by the unique combination of both productive and recreational functions achieved in this type of facility which has made collective gardening extremely popular. Collective gardens are organized on the land leased to productive enterprises and organizations. Smaller plots of land within the estate (as a rule 600 m”) are turned over to persons organized in communities (cooperatives) set up for the purpose. The plots of land are utilized for growing orchards and kitchen gardens as well as for building houses. Thus, collective gardening becomes one of the principal aspects of the agro-agricultural activity (ARA) of the townsfolk which also includes collective vegetable growing, collective cattle-breeding and other activities connected with the cultivation of land or the breeding of livestock done outside working hours and having, in addition to purely economic purposes, a healthrelated importance. The ARAs have now become very widespread and represent a new aspect of townlife, The structure of the ARA varies with the type and size of a town or a city. For the people of Leningrad, for example, the following picture is characteristic (the two numbers given in parentheses denote the percentages of questionnaire respondents undertaking the given kind of activity, regularly or sporadically, respectively):~ work on a plot of one’s own in a gardening community (24,6); helping relatives or friends in cultivating their plots (5, 43); helping relatives living in the country (16,43); planting in the yard of one’s house in town or in adjacent streets (4,41); growing flowers and vegetables inside one’s flat in town or on the balcony (38, 39). It was found that 24% of families in Leningrad have already got a plot in a gardening community, 15% have bought (or retained) houses in villages, about 6% take part in collective vegetable growing, and 2% have country cottages (dachas) of their own. This means that about 47% of families are engaged in the cultivation of the land and are involved in those ARAs connected with the production of foodstuffs in vast amounts. The average percentages of the various types of land plot belonging to townspeople across the entire country are as follows: 55% are used for gardening, 31% for vegetable growing, 13% are those attached to country houses in villages, and 1% is occupied by dachas (summer cottages). For Leningrad the percentages are somewhat different: 51, 13,32,4. The results of polling show a persistent interest on the
101 part of the population in ARAs: 28% of Leningrad families would like to acquire a dacha (summer cottage), 30% a plot in a gardening community, 29% a house in a village, and 5% a plot for growing a kitchen garden. Recreation on a garden plot of one’s own occupies an indubitably leading position among the various kinds of recreation and leisure (it is preferred by 45% of those questioned); the second position (19%) is held by trips to rest homes and health resorts, the third by camping in recreation centres with detached family cottages. Ninety-two per cent of the pollees would like to have a country cottage (dacha) (a plot in a gardening community, a house in a village) of their own. Among the motives behind this preference the following are prevalent: ecological [to be able to go out of town more often (90%), to get closer to nature (89%)]; health [to provide healthy recreation for the young (86%), to keep up one’s own health (78%), to engage in physical labour (72%)]; ~~tr~t~onaZ fto consume more fruit and vegetables (SO%)]. In the Leningrader’s opinion, the availability of a country house (a gardening plot) is beneficial for health (92%), for bringing up children (88%), for fuller recreation during weekends (83%), for the quality of food consumed (81%), and for family life (79%). Those engaged in gardening said that this occupation makes their life richer, fuller, and more interesting. Collective gardening, alongside other kinds of ARA, will develop in the near future at priority rates. By the beginning of 1987 there were almost 7 million families engaged in collective gardening in the country as a whole, which is 2.5 times more than in 1970, and 1.75 times more than in 1980. U.S.S.R. government decisions provide for an increase in the number of participants in collective gardening to 11 or 12 million by the year 1990. In the Leningrad region 300,000 families are now engaged in gardening, and by our estimates, about the same number would like to acquire a plot for gardening in the near future. The total number of plots needed is no less than half of the number of families living in the city. The ARA now occupies up to first place among those activities contributing to the formation of summertime passenger flows between the town and the country. It sharply increases the closeness of ties between the city and its suburbs, and contributes to a reduction in the share of time spent by the townsfolk in the city. It is the immense scale of ARAs that makes it logical to pose the possibility of expanding the amount of time spent by townspeople outside the borders of the city proper. The ARA as the most meaningful and organized mechanism for such an
102
Geoforum/Volume
expansion can become one of the basic processes to achieve this, thus becoming fundamental to the establishment of an integral rural-urban environment. This becomes possible with a focused and regulated approach to the development of ARAs, with improvements in the organization of collective gardening. Until recently there existed the practice of unjustifiably restricting the allocation of land for gardening, as a result of which only 10% of the plots are within an hour’s distance from Leningrad, and over SO% are within the 3 hr distance zone or even beyond that. The administrative districts adjacent to Leningrad have become areas of concentration for most of the gardens. Here the garden plots occupy a land area comparable with the area of communal ploughland, and the summertime inflow of people into gardening communities and other recreational facilities (pioneers’ camps, rest homes, etc.) exceeds the local population by 2-4 times, which brings serious problems.
Agro-recreational
Complexes
and Systems
Finding a solution to the transportation problem and to obstacles posed by the infrastructure is made difficult, among other things, by a common underestimation of the scale and importance of ARAs, which has not been overcome until recently, the consequential inadequate scientific analysis of the process, and the absence of clear ideas regarding its nature. For instance, there are no authentic data on the temporal routine of visiting the plot and living there. Therefore, estimates derived by us from 400 gardeners in a poll are of interest as they clear up some essential questions. I proceed from the assumption that collective gardening communities represent a certain kind of seasonal recreational settlement consisting of the second homes of townspeople. As practically every one of the gardeners erects a cottage on his plot to live in at weekends, during annual leaves, and in many cases for the whole summer, then the largest gardening communities appear to become seasonal residential areas with a very large population. With presentday territorial organization, the populations of many of those in the Leningrad region exceed 10,000, and attain 100,000 on summer weekends. At weekends there are no less than three or four people on each garden plot on average. On weekdays 35% of the plots are peopled by two or three persons each. As a rule this means one grown-up with a child or two, i.e. half or even two-thirds of the weekday population of
22 Number
l/l991
a gardening community consists of children. Of families having children under 10 years of age, 53.5% bring children out to their plots for the whole summer, and 25.5% for a month or two. The population reaches its maximum in July and August, and about half of the plot owners spend their annual leaves there. As a result, in summer collective gardening communities become areas with a density of population not much different from that in cities. Without a proper infrastructure such gigantic gardening communities become unsuitable for recreation and rest. There are practically no sports, cultural and service facilities there, even of a most primitive kind. Many of the communities lack even a water supply system and electric power. Their complex development would greatly enhance their economic and recreational efficiency. In the future the presently existing collective gardening estates will, as a result of infrastructural improvement, turn into local ngro-recreationnl complexes (ARCS), which will boast a well-balanced combination of productive and recreational spheres of activity and proportionality within each of them. fully developed productive and social infrastructures, and strong interconnections with the productive and housing systems of the region where the ARC is situated. With a growth in scale and a higher level of ARA organization, in my opinion there may be formed agro-recreational area1 systems ( ARASs) on the basis of local ARCS within a certain area co-operating with other agro-recreational institutions. In view of the traditional importance of purely formal administrative processes, one can assume that those ARASs incorporating component parts belonging to the organizations of one administrative district and situated within one rural district will enjoy more successful development. Long-term ties between rural and urban districts established in this way will contribute to the mutual enrichment of both urban and rural environments. The urban district will obtain a necessary ‘outside adjunct’, where recreation centres, pioneer camps, collective gardens, summer cottage settlements, housing co-operatives for (dacha) townspeople wishing to own an out-of-town residence, etc. will function as a joint complex. Such forms of organization could regularize the process of the townsfolk’s penetration into the country and be advantageous both for the countryside, which would get additional investment in the development of its new possibilities for recruiting infrastructure, seasonal workers, expanding social opportunities for
Geoforum/Volume
22 Number l/1991
the young countryfolk and so on, and for the town, where food supplies would grow and there would be better opportunities for people temporarily to migrate into the countryside. In this case the permanent migration of some groups of townspeople back into rural areas, or at least an increase in the share of time spent by the townsfolk out of town, can be anticipated. An ARAS may include homes for the elderly, pre-school care centres for children and summer dacha settlements. The development of the ARAS will take place in accordance with the interests of the town district, financed by the town-based industrial enterprises and closely co-ordinated with the country district. Depending upon location the ARAS will include various component parts. The closer it is to the city, the less there will be the necessity to build a separate infrastructure. Individual local ARASs may also function successfully on the basis of collective gardening communities. In distant regions it is more important to secure an organic combination of the ARAS with the local agro-industrial systems and to develop a mutually acceptable pattern of housing. Conclusion
The future development of coltective gardening and other kinds of ARAs will strengthen the ties between
103 town and country, and expand the environment and habitat of the townsfolk, who will spend a considerable part of their time out of town. Local ARCS and ARASs formed on the basis of ARAs are the best possible complement to the urban environment. The endowment of the countryside with recreational functions will further the division of labour between the town and the country, and make the rural-urban environment properly integral. At the same time al1 kinds of ARAs contribute to the ecological situation within the urban environment, and bring specific country ways into the life of the town, which helps to solve problems of improving the quality of environment for all social and regional subsystems of Soviet society.
Notes 1. Cf. Krupny sotsiulistict’zeskiy gorod: structurny uspekt razvitiya (The Large Socialist City: Structural Aspect
of Development), pp. 91-100. Nauka, Leningrad (1987). 2. Here and further use is made of data from the sociological investigation entitled ‘The townsman and gardening’ undertaken by the U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences Institute of Socio-Economic Problems in 1987. Two thousand questionnaires distributed to townsfolk by post and 400 questionnaires administered to the gardeners in the collective gardens were analyzed.
Geoforum, Vol. 22. No. 1. pp. 9!%103. 1991 Printed in Great Britain
The Role Played by Agro-recreational Activities in the Formation of an Integral Rural-Urban Environment
B. S. ZHIKHAREVICH
Abstract: Using the city region of Leningrad as the basis for research, an analysis of those processes leading to the integration of city and countryside is undertaken. The focus of the investigation is on what are termed ‘agro-recreational activities’, which embrace the collective gardening and associated recreational activities of city dwellers which take place in rural areas close to the city. Such activities have a growing recreational significance for the inhabitants of big cities and make an important contribution to the local production of fruit and vegetables. Questionnaire surveys of urban residents and collective gardeners reveal the present-day leisure patterns of gardeners and the unmet demand for various kinds of agro-recreational activity. Transportational and other types of infrastructural improvement may ultimately lead to the formation of agro-recreational complexes and systems which will balance productive and recreational activities at various scales and levels, and further enhance rural-urban integration.
Processes of Integration Country
between
side is increasing together with the number of feaelements of sotures common to both as structural ciety as a whole, whereas at the base level production and non-production ties between individual economic enterprises as well as resource and infrastructural subsystems of specific towns and villages are being strengthened and intensified.
Town and
tendency to integrate has now become a predominant force in the territorial organization of society. It can best be seen in local township systems at the regional level, where the most advanced of the present-day forms of combined productionand lifeenvironmental sociosustaining systems-the economic complex-is being developed.’ One of the key aspects of this process lies in overcoming the mutual isolation of the city and the countryside as subsystems of society, in increasing their interaction, and, in a number of cases, in their structural fusion and the establishment of a new integral entity which can be achieved as a result of the productive and socio-economic integration of town and country.
The
The concept of the productive integration of town and country
Integration presupposes mutual changes involving the innermost structures of the objects undergoing integration, without which a new entity cannot emerge. There are three possible ways for such an entity to be formed, theoretically distinguishable and integrative to various degrees. The first one is the absorption by a leading partner of the other partner, the complete drawing of the latter into the former’s orbit, its dissolution. In this way the city absorbs nearby villages, turning them first into ‘sleeping compartments’, the outskirts of the city, and then drawing them within its borders. In all this the structural changes in the leading partner are insignificant, they have no essential value, and the integrative tendency of the process itself is expressed weakly and in a very limited form.
and socio-economic involves the whole
array of processes taking place at different levels of socialist society, when at its superstructural level the interdependence between the city and the country99
100 The second way involves the mutual exchange of essential characteristics and the acquisition of new ones, common to both parties involved in the integration process, as a result of which the parties become alike, indistinguishable, homogeneous. This takes place, for instance, when processes typical of urban housing construction are spread into the rural areas together with city life patterns and the devetopment of non-agrarian activities. In this case the countryside loses its essential characteristics and disappears as a counterpart in the ‘town vs country’ dichotomy. This kind of integration (on the basis of a rapprochement) means, on the one hand, a certain levelling of differences, a loss of originality and an increase in entropy. However, on the other hand, there is a compensatory increase in fruitful diversity as well. Thus, the rapprochement between the city and the countryside in types and degrees of production concentration and in labour conditions is accompanied by the preservation and deepening of differences in specific natural parameters, in functions performed, etc. The number and choice of professional occupations and other jobs grows on account of the supplementing of traditional city and countryside jobs with new ones, both rural-urban and agroindustrial. The third way-properly integrative in the narrow sense-lies in deepening the differences in essence and in functions to such an extent that each of the parties in the integration process can no longer exist isolated of the other one; a new system emerges, including in itself formerly independent objects now inseparably joined as functional subsystems indissoluble from the whole. In reality the above-mentioned ways of forming an integral rural-urban environment are intertwined, sometimes contradicting one another, but they steadily transform the local environment. Hence the rapprochement between, and the integration of the city and the countryside are determined not only by the processes operative in the production sphere and the productive forces (such as the industrialization of agriculture, establishment of agroindustrial complexes, and so on) but by those processes which reflect integrative tendencies in people’s mode of settlement and their leisure activities. Thus, a very significant interaction between the city and the country is brought forth by the recreational activities of the city-dwellers.
Geoforum/Volume Rural-Urban Activities
Integration
22 Number l/l991
and Agro-recreational
Satisfaction of the townfolk’s demand for out-oftown Ieisure opportunities and a second home in the countryside is one of the most pressing problems of big cities in the U.S.S.R. It can never be solved without taking into account both the countryside adjacent to a big city and that more distant. This demand is developing alongside a growth in the number of cities and in their sizes and has reached a very large scale at present. The desire to possess a second home is caused by increases in standards of living, the growth in the amount of spare time. higher levels of motorization, the unfavourable ecological situation and the housing deficiency in towns, the comparative ageing of the population, and related problems of work and leisure for the retired. By the ‘second home’ are meant dwellings usually located out of town and intended not for permanent residence but for individual and family leisure. The principal types of second home in the U.S.S.R. are the following: (a) private country cottages (dachas) and those in dacha-building co-operatives. (b) stateowned country cottages leased to certain categories of citizens and to organizations, (c) rest and recreation homes planned as settlements made up of individual cottages and belonging to an organization which lets them to its personnel, (d) rooms rented from the local population, (e) cottages in the gardening communities of workers belonging to their members, and (f) houses in villages. As to the form of property, all the above types are divided into two categories. The first one, comprising dacha cottages and garden community cottages, endows the owners with every right of possession, disposal and use, together with related duties. This kind of residence makes up not less than half of the total number of second homes. The second homes in the other category are leased to individuals or groups for a stipulated term and may not be sold or otherwise disposed of. Some of them are state property, the rest are collectively or privately owned by landlords who lease them out. According to the type of settlement, second homes can be subdivided into those grouped in specific seasonal residential areas (dacha settlements. collective gardening communities) and those incorporated within an established permanent, rural or urban settlement. Gardening plots in collective gardening communities
GeoforumNolume
22 Number l/1991
now represent the type of second home most easily affordable by the population, as well as most useful to society. This is explained by the unique combination of both productive and recreational functions achieved in this type of facility which has made collective gardening extremely popular. Collective gardens are organized on the land leased to productive enterprises and organizations. Smaller plots of land within the estate (as a rule 600 m”) are turned over to persons organized in communities (cooperatives) set up for the purpose. The plots of land are utilized for growing orchards and kitchen gardens as well as for building houses. Thus, collective gardening becomes one of the principal aspects of the agro-agricultural activity (ARA) of the townsfolk which also includes collective vegetable growing, collective cattle-breeding and other activities connected with the cultivation of land or the breeding of livestock done outside working hours and having, in addition to purely economic purposes, a healthrelated importance. The ARAs have now become very widespread and represent a new aspect of townlife, The structure of the ARA varies with the type and size of a town or a city. For the people of Leningrad, for example, the following picture is characteristic (the two numbers given in parentheses denote the percentages of questionnaire respondents undertaking the given kind of activity, regularly or sporadically, respectively):~ work on a plot of one’s own in a gardening community (24,6); helping relatives or friends in cultivating their plots (5, 43); helping relatives living in the country (16,43); planting in the yard of one’s house in town or in adjacent streets (4,41); growing flowers and vegetables inside one’s flat in town or on the balcony (38, 39). It was found that 24% of families in Leningrad have already got a plot in a gardening community, 15% have bought (or retained) houses in villages, about 6% take part in collective vegetable growing, and 2% have country cottages (dachas) of their own. This means that about 47% of families are engaged in the cultivation of the land and are involved in those ARAs connected with the production of foodstuffs in vast amounts. The average percentages of the various types of land plot belonging to townspeople across the entire country are as follows: 55% are used for gardening, 31% for vegetable growing, 13% are those attached to country houses in villages, and 1% is occupied by dachas (summer cottages). For Leningrad the percentages are somewhat different: 51, 13,32,4. The results of polling show a persistent interest on the
101 part of the population in ARAs: 28% of Leningrad families would like to acquire a dacha (summer cottage), 30% a plot in a gardening community, 29% a house in a village, and 5% a plot for growing a kitchen garden. Recreation on a garden plot of one’s own occupies an indubitably leading position among the various kinds of recreation and leisure (it is preferred by 45% of those questioned); the second position (19%) is held by trips to rest homes and health resorts, the third by camping in recreation centres with detached family cottages. Ninety-two per cent of the pollees would like to have a country cottage (dacha) (a plot in a gardening community, a house in a village) of their own. Among the motives behind this preference the following are prevalent: ecological [to be able to go out of town more often (90%), to get closer to nature (89%)]; health [to provide healthy recreation for the young (86%), to keep up one’s own health (78%), to engage in physical labour (72%)]; ~~tr~t~onaZ fto consume more fruit and vegetables (SO%)]. In the Leningrader’s opinion, the availability of a country house (a gardening plot) is beneficial for health (92%), for bringing up children (88%), for fuller recreation during weekends (83%), for the quality of food consumed (81%), and for family life (79%). Those engaged in gardening said that this occupation makes their life richer, fuller, and more interesting. Collective gardening, alongside other kinds of ARA, will develop in the near future at priority rates. By the beginning of 1987 there were almost 7 million families engaged in collective gardening in the country as a whole, which is 2.5 times more than in 1970, and 1.75 times more than in 1980. U.S.S.R. government decisions provide for an increase in the number of participants in collective gardening to 11 or 12 million by the year 1990. In the Leningrad region 300,000 families are now engaged in gardening, and by our estimates, about the same number would like to acquire a plot for gardening in the near future. The total number of plots needed is no less than half of the number of families living in the city. The ARA now occupies up to first place among those activities contributing to the formation of summertime passenger flows between the town and the country. It sharply increases the closeness of ties between the city and its suburbs, and contributes to a reduction in the share of time spent by the townsfolk in the city. It is the immense scale of ARAs that makes it logical to pose the possibility of expanding the amount of time spent by townspeople outside the borders of the city proper. The ARA as the most meaningful and organized mechanism for such an
102
Geoforum/Volume
expansion can become one of the basic processes to achieve this, thus becoming fundamental to the establishment of an integral rural-urban environment. This becomes possible with a focused and regulated approach to the development of ARAs, with improvements in the organization of collective gardening. Until recently there existed the practice of unjustifiably restricting the allocation of land for gardening, as a result of which only 10% of the plots are within an hour’s distance from Leningrad, and over SO% are within the 3 hr distance zone or even beyond that. The administrative districts adjacent to Leningrad have become areas of concentration for most of the gardens. Here the garden plots occupy a land area comparable with the area of communal ploughland, and the summertime inflow of people into gardening communities and other recreational facilities (pioneers’ camps, rest homes, etc.) exceeds the local population by 2-4 times, which brings serious problems.
Agro-recreational
Complexes
and Systems
Finding a solution to the transportation problem and to obstacles posed by the infrastructure is made difficult, among other things, by a common underestimation of the scale and importance of ARAs, which has not been overcome until recently, the consequential inadequate scientific analysis of the process, and the absence of clear ideas regarding its nature. For instance, there are no authentic data on the temporal routine of visiting the plot and living there. Therefore, estimates derived by us from 400 gardeners in a poll are of interest as they clear up some essential questions. I proceed from the assumption that collective gardening communities represent a certain kind of seasonal recreational settlement consisting of the second homes of townspeople. As practically every one of the gardeners erects a cottage on his plot to live in at weekends, during annual leaves, and in many cases for the whole summer, then the largest gardening communities appear to become seasonal residential areas with a very large population. With presentday territorial organization, the populations of many of those in the Leningrad region exceed 10,000, and attain 100,000 on summer weekends. At weekends there are no less than three or four people on each garden plot on average. On weekdays 35% of the plots are peopled by two or three persons each. As a rule this means one grown-up with a child or two, i.e. half or even two-thirds of the weekday population of
22 Number
l/l991
a gardening community consists of children. Of families having children under 10 years of age, 53.5% bring children out to their plots for the whole summer, and 25.5% for a month or two. The population reaches its maximum in July and August, and about half of the plot owners spend their annual leaves there. As a result, in summer collective gardening communities become areas with a density of population not much different from that in cities. Without a proper infrastructure such gigantic gardening communities become unsuitable for recreation and rest. There are practically no sports, cultural and service facilities there, even of a most primitive kind. Many of the communities lack even a water supply system and electric power. Their complex development would greatly enhance their economic and recreational efficiency. In the future the presently existing collective gardening estates will, as a result of infrastructural improvement, turn into local ngro-recreationnl complexes (ARCS), which will boast a well-balanced combination of productive and recreational spheres of activity and proportionality within each of them. fully developed productive and social infrastructures, and strong interconnections with the productive and housing systems of the region where the ARC is situated. With a growth in scale and a higher level of ARA organization, in my opinion there may be formed agro-recreational area1 systems ( ARASs) on the basis of local ARCS within a certain area co-operating with other agro-recreational institutions. In view of the traditional importance of purely formal administrative processes, one can assume that those ARASs incorporating component parts belonging to the organizations of one administrative district and situated within one rural district will enjoy more successful development. Long-term ties between rural and urban districts established in this way will contribute to the mutual enrichment of both urban and rural environments. The urban district will obtain a necessary ‘outside adjunct’, where recreation centres, pioneer camps, collective gardens, summer cottage settlements, housing co-operatives for (dacha) townspeople wishing to own an out-of-town residence, etc. will function as a joint complex. Such forms of organization could regularize the process of the townsfolk’s penetration into the country and be advantageous both for the countryside, which would get additional investment in the development of its new possibilities for recruiting infrastructure, seasonal workers, expanding social opportunities for
Geoforum/Volume
22 Number l/1991
the young countryfolk and so on, and for the town, where food supplies would grow and there would be better opportunities for people temporarily to migrate into the countryside. In this case the permanent migration of some groups of townspeople back into rural areas, or at least an increase in the share of time spent by the townsfolk out of town, can be anticipated. An ARAS may include homes for the elderly, pre-school care centres for children and summer dacha settlements. The development of the ARAS will take place in accordance with the interests of the town district, financed by the town-based industrial enterprises and closely co-ordinated with the country district. Depending upon location the ARAS will include various component parts. The closer it is to the city, the less there will be the necessity to build a separate infrastructure. Individual local ARASs may also function successfully on the basis of collective gardening communities. In distant regions it is more important to secure an organic combination of the ARAS with the local agro-industrial systems and to develop a mutually acceptable pattern of housing. Conclusion
The future development of coltective gardening and other kinds of ARAs will strengthen the ties between
103 town and country, and expand the environment and habitat of the townsfolk, who will spend a considerable part of their time out of town. Local ARCS and ARASs formed on the basis of ARAs are the best possible complement to the urban environment. The endowment of the countryside with recreational functions will further the division of labour between the town and the country, and make the rural-urban environment properly integral. At the same time al1 kinds of ARAs contribute to the ecological situation within the urban environment, and bring specific country ways into the life of the town, which helps to solve problems of improving the quality of environment for all social and regional subsystems of Soviet society.
Notes 1. Cf. Krupny sotsiulistict’zeskiy gorod: structurny uspekt razvitiya (The Large Socialist City: Structural Aspect
of Development), pp. 91-100. Nauka, Leningrad (1987). 2. Here and further use is made of data from the sociological investigation entitled ‘The townsman and gardening’ undertaken by the U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences Institute of Socio-Economic Problems in 1987. Two thousand questionnaires distributed to townsfolk by post and 400 questionnaires administered to the gardeners in the collective gardens were analyzed.