Harvest, railway transportation and banking services to the agriculture in the Central Black Earth Region of the Russian Empire in the late 19th century

Abstract

This paper studies the influence of the service sector (joint-stock commercial banks and railways) on the economic development of agricultural regions within the Russian empire in the second half of the 19th century, using the case of the Central Black Earth region. The study compares yield data for major crops, railroad transportation of grain and flour, and the banking services to agriculture producers and traders. Statistical analysis of this data disproves the prevailing historical economic viewpoint which claims that agricultural exports were not accompanied by bank support, because it did not take into account a rather high level of infrastructure around the Riga-Oryol railway trunk, which was formed back in the 1870s. The exports in this region consisted of the prior year's harvest, which indicated a rather developed system of crop storage and accompanying banking services. The study reveals a dramatic growth in the services sector throughout the Central Black Earth region during the 1890s. In previous decades, this system could not be extended to the entire region due to a long history of unfavorable conditions in the agricultural and banking sectors. Thus, banking services in Russia at the end of the 19th century were provided to not just industrial and stock markets customers. In those regions dominated by agriculture, services infrastructure had been oriented towards this sector.