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'Agriculture and demographics
Hunger played a role in the outcome of the Great War. Choked by blockade, the Central Powers were unable to properly feed their armies and civilian populations, with disastrous consequences for morale.
Twenty years later, food remained a topic as critical as manpower and industrial production. What was at stake was, first of all, morale. The Reich’s leadership remembered the past war all too well and was determined to keep the German population well fed at all costs. There was a geopolitical dimension: one of the reasons Franco chose not to enter the war was that he knew Axis Europe couldn’t feed Spain. And an economic: workers without sufficient nutrition, not just in total calories but also in protein and fat, could not be expected to be productive, particularly in sectors such as coal mining.
Yet the continent’s food situation wasn’t much safer. As discussed, even in peacetime it wasn’t strong, and now blockade and mobilization came with crushing force. By the time France was defeated Germany had on its hands an “Europe-wide agricultural crisis”. In 1940 French yields fell to less than half of their 1938 value with smaller contractions in the Netherlands, Yugoslavia, Hungary and Germany itself. Poland’s food surplus regions had already been annexed. Only Romania increased its grain deliveries, and in time the Soviet Union would make its contribution.
If food stocks continued to shrink, Europe’s herds of livestock would be culled, permanently reducing the supply of protein and fat; this had happened in the “pig massacre” of 1916 and was already taking place in small scale with Danish swine and poultry populations.
The RNS, of course, had its stores of grain, starting the war with 8.8 million tons, enough to give bread to the entire German population for a year. On the first year only 1.3 million tons were consumed, but with faltering harvests Herbert Backe was seriously worried about the following years.
Reich agricultural authorities now had to ration Europe’s scarce food supplies. They were concentrated and stratified by the priority of feeding each population, with the civilian German population having reasonable rations on the first years of the war. Within the General Government, rations were highest for the Germans themselves, followed by Poles working in important positions, the Ukrainian minority, Poles in general and Jews. By the end of the year Germans received 2,600 daily calories, Poles in general 938 and Jews 369. By the spring undernourishment had noticeable effects on industrial workers. On several moments food had to be shipped to the General Government, but it made its contribution by supplying labor for German farms.
Rations hovered around 1,600 calories in Czechia and Norway and were as little as 1,300 in Belgium and France. Rations alone don’t describe how much was actually available as there was much black market activity.
Another aspect of food management was the distribution of nitrogen between fertilizer and explosives. It was relevant later on in 1943 and 1944, when explosives were favored, with consequences lasting into the postwar years.