Russia's principal business is AGRICULTURE. More than one half her
whole internal trade is agricultural. Her agricultural products are
one and one half times greater than the products of her manufactures
and ten times greater than her mining products or her imports. And
though her production of grain per acre is the lowest in all Europe
except Italy, Spain, and Portugal, and her total production of all
food products per acre by far the lowest in Europe (not more than one
third that of Spain, which is next lowest), yet she manages to export
a larger quantity of GRAIN than any other country in Europe, France
only sometimes excepted. Russia's export of grain for some years past
has averaged 266,000,000 bushels a year. Her export of WHEAT alone has
averaged 94,000,000 bushels a year, or considerably more than a fifth
of the total wheat export of the world. The explanation of this
enormous export of wheat from so poor a country is that three fourths
of the people live on rye. Among the peasants wheat bread is
practically unknown, and nothing could be more pathetic than the hard
rye lumps which passed as bread during the last famine. Other
agricultural exports (besides grain) are flax, hemp, oil-seed cake,
linseed and grass seed, butter, eggs, wool, hides, and hogs' bristles.
Wood, lumber, and timber are also extensively exported. England is
Russia's best customer. The amount of England's annual importation of
the above products (including grain) exceeds $112,000,000.