and proportionately of higher value per unit weight than cereals, it can be profitably exported to Europe and England from the principal districts in the agricultural zones of Western Siberia. As stated above, wheat is not a very profitable crop for export, since the price must be so low, to bear the high transport rate from these districts, that the profit on export is practically absorbed. Everything therefore favours high-priced articles of small bulk, which can bear the cost of transport to the industrial centres of Western Europe. Butter and eggs are the principal articles of this kind produced in these districts. The Government has taken much interest in developing the dairy industry of the country. It grants loans and subsidies to peasant communities for the institution of dairies and creameries, it has established technical dairy institutes at Kurgan, Omsk, Kainsk and Barnaul, and it has set up refrigerating stores along the railway to facilitate successful transport.
The dairy industry in Siberia began in 1894, and the export of dairy produce to European Russia and Western Europe began in 1897. By the year 1904 exports had risen to 681,000 hundredweights. About this time a great boom in dairying and the butter export trade flourished. It was found that 32 pouds (792 lbs.) of milk, then selling at 18 kopeks per vedro (about 2d per gallon) at the creameries, produced one poud (36 lbs.) of butter, which could be sold in European Russia for six roubles per poud (4½d. per lb.). A large number of German and Danish firms rushed in and profitable business was done for a time. The price of milk was then forced up by excessive competition to 45 kopeks per vedro (5d. per gallon), and soon it became impossible to
