Chiswickite - formerly The Croydonian

 Old BE said... 12:22 pm

Brilliant!  

 Croydonian said... 12:38 pm

That's what I thought. That man Drew has quite a muse.  

 ScotsToryB said... 1:29 pm

Bravo!


STB.  

 Bruce Fleming said... 2:33 pm

First of all, many apologies for raining on Nick's parade. I was going to send you this material by email but could not find where your address is displayed (if indeed it still is).

Here at any rate, as promised before Christmas, are some ... highlights from a speech by Kim Il Sung on poultry farming in the DPRK.

I fear that the Great Leader is a tad fond of the sound of his own voice, so you may wish to prune the material if it merits a separate post (he said vaingloriously) and/or add your own Kremlinology.

___________________________________

ON FURTHER DEVELOPING THE POULTRY INDUSTRY

Address to the National Conference of Poultrymen
March 31, 1970

Kim Il Sung
Collected Works, Vol 25, pp 59-75
___________________________________




"To begin with, on behalf of the Party Central Committee and the Government of the Republic, I should like to extend warm thanks to all workers, technicians and office workers in the poultry industry who have devoted all their energy and talents to the campaign to develop the poultry industry in our country, and to all the working people who have actively helped in the construction of chicken plants."

Times were hard after the Fatherland Liberation War.

"We had to overcome many obstacles and difficulties before we laid the present foundations for poultry raising. We lacked experience in poultry farming, technicians in this field were few, and we did not have any good breeds because of the degeneration of pedigrees."

Not to mention the 3rd Battalion Buff Orpingtons, who took a bit of a pasting on the Imjin River. And the Barred Plymouth Rock Artillery 2nd Div didn't exactly cover themselves with glory at Inchon. Po(u)ltroons, the lot of 'em.

Early efforts were not a success. The Party worked hard to develop poultry farming but (sigh) people failed to run them properly.

"To supply Pyongyang citizens with eggs, we built a big chicken farm in Pyongyang immediately after the ceasefire and sent technicians to a foreign country to learn advanced breeding methods. The workers on the farm, however, tried out advanced breeding methods for only a short time and then gave them up on the excuse that they did not pay and returned to the old, outdated methods."

Poverty of spirit from the workers. No doubt they were taken in hand.

"It was certainly not the fault of Party policy that poultry farming made such a poor showing in the past. Our Party always put forward a correct policy, set a well-defined direction for the work and proposed ways to improve poultry raising. The responsibility for the poor results in the past lies entirely with workers engaged in poultry raising who lacked boldness and confidence in their work tirelessly to carry the Party's policy through to the end."

So, not the Party's fault. Got it? But why poultry?

"Chickens breed and grow faster and eat less than pigs and other domestic [?] animals. Chicken raising is comparatively easy and it can be done intensively. So it is possible to produce large amounts of eggs and chickens with a small work force. In addition, chicken tastes better than pork and is nutritious. The world trend in livestock and poultry breeding is to put emphasis on the development of the poultry industry so as to produce large quantities of chickens and eggs."

That's chickens and eggs. Do pay attention at the back. Thus it was that at the 17th Plenary Meeting of the Fourth Party Central Committee,

"Our Party took the radical decision to build many modern chicken plants. After the plenary meeting, an energetic mass campaign was launched throughout the country to establish modern chicken plants, and the state put considerable effort into the work."

But if much has been done, there is much still to do! Cutting production costs would be a good place to start.

"Some officials do not think about regularizing production and reducing costs at the existing chicken plants, but just suggest constructing new ones. They are wrong."

Oh dear.

"The problem is not that the production capacity is small but that it is not being used to its full extent and, in particular, that the costs of production are high."

So far, we might be forgiven for writing off the Great Leader as a bit of a windbag and perhaps nothing more than an armchair poulterer. But we would be wrong. The costs of production consist largely of feed consumption. And, as we are about to find out, feed consumption depends upon the physiological characteristics of the birds.

"Since they are raised collectively in the sheds of the chicken plants, the birds should be fed with various well-mixed nutrients. Only then can they become highly resistant to disease, grow fat and lay many eggs. A few days ago we visited the Chungwa Chicken Plant, where each hen lays 260-270 eggs a year. This high rate is due to proper feeding suited to the birds' physiological characteristics."

What do they want? Protein.

"I have heard that at one time the Kwangpo Duck Farm fed the ducks only on maize, as protein feed had run out, and the result was that the ducks neither grew well nor laid many eggs."

But that's not all.

"Quantities of different kinds of feed such as vitamins, antibiotics, microelements and dicalcium phosphate should also be supplied. A lot of feed of this kind should be fed to the fowls at the chicken plants since they cannot get much sunlight or enough fresh air. The Sopo Chicken Plant once introduced the cage method, but gave it up after a time precisely because the plant failed to obtain enough of such feed. The Ministry of Chemical Industries must see to it that large quantities of feed such as vitamins, antibiotics, microelements and dicalcium phosphate are produced and supplied to the chicken plants."

And fish meal. Fish meal is good.

"It is only by feeding fish meal regularly to the birds that we can make them grow fast and lay many eggs."

Mortality rates must be reduced, not least by rigorous enforcement of the health and anti-epizootic Regulations. As usual, some are falling down on the job.

"Some chicken plants did not observe the health and anti-epizootic regulations strictly. The Kusong and Hamhung Chicken Plants have taken in different breeds of chickens from various places as well as those supplied by the state, in violation of the regulations."

But it's not all doom and gloom.

"Chicken plague has almost disappeared from our country as a result of the tireless health and anti-epizootic work in the past."

No thanks to the Kusong and Hamhung Chicken Plants.

There follows a lengthy section on mechanization (a good thing) and shops for the repair of machinery and plant but limitations of space mean we are unable to do justice to these innovations.

"In the past we did not build many chicken-packing plants because we did not have enough facilities for killing and freezing the birds. At present, however, we have large facilities. So, during the Six Year Plan, we must build a chicken-packing plant in every big city, such as Hamhung [them again] and Chongjin and in each of the provincial seats, towns and workers' districts so that more chickens will be produced."

On a back of an envelope, by the end of the Six Year Plan, 1,000 million eggs will be produced annually by chicken plants and 2,000 million eggs by the mass movement. Mass movement?

"Let me give an example.

An elderly woman belonging to the third workteam of the Changsuwon Cooperative Farm, Samsok District, Pyongyang, is producing a large number of eggs every year by raising chickens. She begin with ten birds, and now her flock is 15, which gives her an average of eight eggs daily. She does not give much feed to the birds. Though a chicken plant consumes over 160 grammes of feed per egg, she uses 50 grammes or less. According to her account, when the chickens are given a lot of feed in the morning, they do not go out by only sleep on their perches. So they must not be fed in the morning, but should be given a little feed only when they return after pecking around outside. Only then will they readily fly up to the nests and lay eggs. As you see, this elderly woman is well versed in the chickens' habits, and is raising them well."

Use of threshing grounds, public education and technical training, distribution - details omitted. But it would be scandalous to omit mention of the vinyl plastic egg-holder plates.

"Today, in some localities, a great many eggs are cracked because they are transported carelessly in wooden boxes for lack of egg-holder plates. This is really a serious state of affairs. Vinyl plastic egg-holder plates are not difficult to produce nor do they require much vinyl plastic. If the officials show a little initiative they can produce any amount of them. Cadres in commerce must see to it that enough egg-holders and boxes are supplied so that not even a single egg is broken in transit."

With this admonishment, the Great Leader moves towards a long-awaited conclusion and an encouragement to "go to it".

"Comrades, the development of a large scale poultry industry is an honourable task for supplying eggs and chickens to our people who lived in poverty in the past, and it is very useful work for raising our little ones, successors to our revolution, healthy and strong. All workers engaged in poultry breeding should have a high sense of honour and pride in their work and act as one in the struggle to develop the poultry industry. Not only workers in this field but also those in other branches of the national economy should fully understand that the endeavour to develop the poultry industry is an important revolutionary task to improve our people's welfare, and should make a greater contribution to it.

"We must regularize production in the existing chicken plants, build more plants and breed chickens on a large scale through an all-people movement, so that chickens and eggs are supplied in abundance to the rural population as well as to urban dwellers. It is true that this is not an easy task. But if all people put their shoulders to the wheel, that task will certainly be carried out, since we have already laid the firm foundations for the development of the poultry industry and have accumulated rich experience.

"I firmly believe that you will bring about a new improvement in developing our poultry industry by putting the tasks which I have mentioned into effect without fail."

Ends.  

 Anonymous said... 4:17 pm

Excellent effort Nick. Very much appreciated!  

 Nick Drew said... 7:08 pm

thank you thank you *blushes*

the back-catalogue can be mostly found chez Guido, here (with a load of other assorted garbage)

Mangyongbong has to be the greatest word I have encountered in a long while, I couldn't resist

(those of us who are, ahem, senior will recall Lieutenant Pigeon's immortal Mouldy Old Dough - it works really well with Mangyongbong ...)  

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