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''t',.:>. ..>;;-', ....._, 002395 -~~~~-~.') 14 ... WATER RiESOURCEl DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMS ton traffic increased 4.4 times. In the same period on tobl freight tonnage (regardless of distance) U. S. inland waterways doubled their tonnage, while the Soviet tonnage multiplied 8.2 times. After virtually doubling their water-haul traffic in the 15 years preceding 1955, the Soviet authorities commanded a further increase of 80 percent in tonnage shipped by 1960. Much of this is to come in the V olga-Don River development which has made Moscow a port on five seas. It is essential to the economy in a land of great distances to relieve overburdened railroads and re- quires overcoming of two natural hazards. The waterways freeze and the rivers generally run north and south, while the traffic is east and west. The United States Department of Commerce (Bureau of Foreign Commerce) reports freight movement in the U. S. S. R. (in billions oiton-kilometers) as follows: 1940 1945 1950 1954 1955 (war) Rallroads_ ___ _ ~ ~_ _______________ ~ _____ ___~_ __________ 415.0 314.0 602.3 &;6.8 970.9 Inland waterways_ ________________________ ~ _ _ _______ 35.9 18.2 I 45.9 62.4 57.4 NOTE.-Highway traffic, largely limited to local freight, is still in its early stages of development with inadequate vehicles and roads. In February 1956, United Nations records, the Chairman of the Council of Ministers told the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in Moscow: It is planned to increase the volume of our freight carried on the inland water- ways by 80 percent in 5 years (ending in 1960). Whereupon the Council of Ministers voted (unanimously) a "di~ rective" incorporated into a decree to provide forthwith "self-pro- pelled cargo vessels, tugs, and passenger ships of 900,000 horsepower and towed vessels of a capacity of more than 2 million tons" so that Russia's "500,000 kilometers of inland waterways and transport be extended on a wide scale and be the cheapest form of transport." Further, the directive stipulated that oil, grain, timber, coal, and bulk goods be the chief. cargoes and that the tug fleet in the 1955-60 period be increased "not less than 30 percent, the self-propelled cargo vessels not less than 36 percent and the towed vessels not less than 33 percent." Other sections of the "directive" were intended to assure all facilities provided be fully used by shippers for the relief of the railroads. The Department of State (Division of Research and Analysis), by request from independent sources, provided a report on U. S. S. R. water transport on a slightly different basis, but 'COnfirmatory as to result, with a statistical table, as follows: WATER TRANSPORT Inland water transport prOVides about 12 percent of total inland transport in the U. S. S. R. (in terms of ton-kilometers). The proportion has been substan- tially constant since 1940. Two great drawba.cks prevent further extensive de- velopment of water transport iIi the U. S. S. R.: (1) The major rivers run north to south (in the European U. S. S. R.) and south to north (in Siberia) .whIle the major flow of traffic east-west; and (2) waterways are unusable much of the year because of the severe winters.