RUSSIA: Powerful Rabbits

There are earnest, unkempt minor officials in Russia who can find a solution for anything. Russia’s harvested area is 25% less than in 1931 according to figures of Aug. 1. Russian meat is so scarce that U. S. experts have been called in. A long and hungry winter grows nearer. In the face of this Soviet officials have discovered that the rabbit, one of the mainstays of the French bourgeois cuisine, is sadly neglected in Russia. Only 1,500,000 domestic rabbits exist in the Soviet Union. Last week rabbit propaganda was put in motion. A rabbit breeding trust was organized, and an institute of rabbit breeding for 1,000 students. In Moscow, the important Hammer-and-Sickle factory started its own rabbit farm as a patriotic example for other factories. A government program tinged with hope and extracts from Ellis Parker Butler was announced: within one year the 1,500,000 rabbits must become 7,000,000 rabbits, or 25,000,000 by 1934, or 750,000 tons of meat.

The loyal Press swept into line, Izvestia, powerful Moscow daily, ran a streamer headline RABBIT BREEDING IS A POWERFUL AND UNEXPLOITED SOURCE OF WORKERS’ SUPPLIES! Then came diagrams and statistics to prove that the fat rabbit in its entirety contains 40.4% nourishment as compared with 31.6% for the chicken, 27.1% for the pig, 24.2% for the ox. There were earnest assurances that the fat rabbit tastes good too.

“Eschew those,” concluded the editorial, “who underestimate the rabbit.”