Paul Goble
Staunton, July 27 – Moscow may soon allow Russian regions to offer free land to those who will settle it in an expansion of a program begun in 2016 for people in the Russian Far East. But it hasn’t worked there and it is unlikely to work anywhere else such programs are being considered because the land does not come with the infrastructure people need.
To receive free land may sound like an offer few could refuse especially given the view widespread among Russians that land should be free; but without roads, electricity, water and other basic support systems, most people won’t take it because the difficulties of building such things on one’s own are simply too great (newizv.ru/news/2023-07-26/zemlya-narodu-ne-nuzhna-pochemu-lyudi-otkazyvayutsya-ot-besplatnyh-uchastkov-414522).
The free land program for the Russian Far East has failed. The population of the Far Eastern Federal District has continued to fall and is projected to fall still more over the next few years (eastrussia.ru/news/dfo-mozhet-poteryat-8-naseleniya/). That makes all the recent talk about taking similar steps elsewhere more propagandistic than real.
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