Russia eradicates food poverty

By Rhod Mackenzie

According to a recent report by Rosstat the number of Russians who are considered  the most economically disadvantaged or as I would like to call it poor and who are unable to afford basic foodstuffs has been reduced to the level  of zero. The report discovered that all Russian families have enough money to purchase sufficient enough food to keep them well fed and not to go hungry.
Now before you all leap to your keyboards and accuse me of spouting Russian propaganda please listen and I will carefull explain how this has happened and a few simple searchs on Google or someother platform will confirm it

Firstly I think you will all agree that there are three things are are essential in this world, A roof over your head, enough food to sustain a healthy life and energy for heating and cooking.
Now let me explain in detail how all of these things work in Russia.
Firstly Russia has 92% home ownership, yes that is a verifiable fact. easily checked on a search engine.
Now how did a country that had 70 years of communist rule where there was little private property of businesses and everything was state owned?
Well in 1991 when the Soviet Union collapsed who lived in what were state owned apatemrnts and houses were gifted them! Yes they were just given ownership of the place they lived.
For example my wife was 12 yrs old when the Soviet Union collapsed and she lived with her parents and sister in an aprartment and now she owns 25% of that apartment which her mother and sister still live in.
This happened to everybody so in a day Russians went from owning nothing to having one of the largest levels of home ownership in the World and far surpasses the levels of home ownership in the west.
Just imagine waking up one day and finding out you were a property owner mortgage free which is something those in the west can only dream about.
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There is almost no social housing in Russia except for some for the military and the rental market is very low compared to the West.
Now housing in Russia is affordable even cities like Moscow and St Petersburg due to the abundance of land available for building so there are new apartment blocks being built all the time. When I say affordable I mean that a young couple can purchase an apartment based on their joint income multiple of 3 times their annual salary and when they have a child or more they can receive preferential mortgages subsidised by the govt to support families plus there are other financial benefits like a lump sum on the birth of a child regular payments to support the bringing of that child and that increases with every extra baby a family has. The Russian President Vladimir Putin has put the support of families at the heart of his agenda.
Now when you have low or no costs for having a roof over your head then you have more of your income to spend on other things.Now I would like to point out that there are NO Property Taxes in Russia like they have in the US or UK with council tax for paying for services they are all covered by the very low income tax of 13%

Now Energy and Heating!
The costs for energy,that means for the central heating,hot water 24/7, electricty, water and gas are very low compared to costs in the West.
The city I live in has around six months of winter where temps get to -40 celcius on occasions so having a reliable constant central heating system 24/7 is not a luxury but a matter of life or death.
My heating system is on 24/7 from Oct 1st to April 30th and sometimes its so hot I open the window to let the cold air in. This sytsem like most in Russia is a communal system which supplies the whole neignbour hood. We have a heating and hot water station that is powered by the cheap and abundant natural gas that is extracted from under the rich black black soil of the Steppe.
It pumps hot water directly into my apartment and fills my radiators with piping hot water,in fact you can dry a pair of wet demin jeans straight out of the washing machine on one of them in 20 mins. Plus I have constant hot water 24/7 with no need to put on the water heater every time I want a shower or do the washing up.
Now what does that cost? Well I live in a large 2 bed apartment and my costs for all utilities and that includes,heating,electricity,hot water and gas for cooking and my total annual bills are around $350 .Now when I lived in London over a decade ago my bills for just gas were around that per month. So unlike the UK people in Russia do not have to choose between heating and eating.

Now for Food!
As some of you might be aware from watching my previous videos Russia is one of the world's largest food producers,it is aleader in the production of a wide range of foodstuffs and all of it of high quality and no Genetically Modified Organisms are allowed.This means that there is an abundance of food available to the consumer and at prices that will shock most people in the West.

The cost of basic foodstuffs in Russia is relatively low compared to the West,my sister came from NZ for my wedding to Marina and could not believe that she could buy kiwi fruit in a supermarket in Ufa cheaper than in downtown Auckland. Now bear in mind that Ufa is 2000 kms in any direction from the sea and they are imported.
Just as an example you can buy a 10 kilo bag of flour for $8, a 3 kilo chicken for $3. So food shopping is relatvely inexpensive for the basic and nutirious foods plus most Russians cook their meals from scratch using all the available ingredients.
Some of you may have seen Tucker Calson in his video on his visit to a Russian supermarket where he marveled at the low costs which he estimated be a fifth of the price in the US,that did make me laugh as he filmed the video in one of the most expensive supermarkets in Moscow.
Also on food and growing it I have to talk about the Dacha. Now a dacha is a small holding just out side of the city or town,its a place for the weekend and for growing your own fruit and veg. Almost all have a small house on it for weekend and longer stays, our dacha even has a banya ( which is a russian sauna) we also drilled down to a water source so have plenty of clean spring water for all the plants. The size of the land is around 1 acre and we have a number of greenhouses and polytunnels
Now at the Dacha we grow everything we can, that includes,cabbages,carrots,beetroots,onions,garlic and potatoes. In the greenhouses we grow cucumbers,peppers and tomatoes plus herbs.
This is much the same as many families who use the Dacha not leasure but also to supplement their diet with quality and nuticious food.
For example I make l my own pasta sauce from the tomatoes,peppers,garlic and herbs. I make chutney's and jams, I pickel cucumbers and onions.All of this is stored and used throughout the winter and spring.
The cabbages,carrots and potatoes etc which by the way taste so much better than stuff from the supermarke also see us through the winters
So Russia's families are thriving and food poverty has been eradicated by the fact that people keep more of their income because of low taxes,low utility bills and low food prices plus obviously having access to a dacha