Yugoslavia

Agriculture

Chief agricultural products include corn, sugar beets, wheat, potatoes, grapes, plums, cattle, pigs, and sheep. Vojvodina, in northern Serbia, contains the most fertile land. Cooperative farms in Yugoslavia did not take root under the socialist regime, but the government of Milosevic exported wheat and corn heavily (contributing 25 percent of Serbia's hard currency) and bartered grain for oil and gas from Iraq, Libya, Syria, and the Ukraine. This practice exploited farmers by paying them below-market prices and limiting their access to the free market. Farmers had no alternatives but to sell to state mills as most did not have storage facilities and permits to trade. Police harassed them, and if caught selling outside

state outlets, they were fined US$2,000. The drought in the summer of 2000 was considered the worst in 7 decades and food shortages threatened throughout the winter of 2000-2001, with the corn harvest about 50 percent lower compared to 1999. Sunflower seeds were also down by 60-70 percent, soya by 40-50 percent, and fodder crops by 40-50 percent. International humanitarian aid pledged by the European Union and other donors following Milosevic's removal in October 2000 may compensate for the shortages.