The Cold Farm in Finland

IN September, I944, nearly 35,ooo Finnish families left their in territory ceded to the U.S.S.R. and entered as refagees into the remaining nine-tenths of Finland; by mid-i95i all had found new holdings. Holdings were acquired mostly through resettlement legislation passed in May, I945.' Tw-o distinct types of were established: so-called farms and warm farms. Cold are those which the yield at the moment of establishment does not exceed ten per cent of the yield to be expected from all the agricultural land on the farm when in a condition ensuring full yield and on which no accessible buildings exist. Somewhat more than gooo cold have been occupied by owner-farmers. Warm farms, born of divided holdings, already possess a proportion of cultivated land and/or acceptable farm buildings. This essay has a dual purpose: to describe a sample area of agricultural colonization in the coniferous forest at a time when pioneering has generally ceased, and to provide a basis for appreciation of the seasonal adjustments of labor on the pioneer farm. Examples are drawn from the parish of Lapinlahti, in the north-central lake country. Lapinlahti was chosen for several reasons. The parish was already the object of sociological investigations by the Yhteiskunnallinen Korkeakoulu (High School of Social Science), Helsinki. Observations on the physical adjustment could therefore supplement those on the psychological adjustment which were the objective of this institute's research. Also, Lapinlahti is situated on the frontier of liveliest attack on the forest in prewar Finland, stretching in an arc from the estuary

Agricultural economics · Economics · Environmental protection · Geography · Socioeconomics · Rural development and sustainability

• The making of a sub‐discipline

  Open Access•Jonathan D Oldfield, Jonathan Oldfield et al.•Transactions of the Institute of…•2011

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