Kovács Attila: Földreform és kolonizáció a Lendva-vidéken a két világháború között (Lendva, 2004)

XVII. Summary

vicarages in the Lendva region in exchange for the liquidation of the church patronages received 148 cadastral acres and 1,490 square metres of arable land, while in accordance with the regulation on facultative land purchase, 510 cadastral acres and 1,445 square metres were distributed on the examined area.

Despite the fact that due to the agrarian reform, the Alsólendva Esterházy estate that had operated for centuries practically ceased to exist, the land distribution did not fulfil hopes - the establishment of strong peasant farms and the creation of the opportunity of individual farming. The land reform and colonisation performed in the Lendva region did not solve the urgent problem of the region, the fate of the vast number of smallholders fighting against the danger of poverty. Indeed, by distributing the estate land suitable for agricultural use - with the few exceptions of course - among the colonists and the Slovenians and Croatians arriving from the neighbouring Muraköz with local agrarian interests it further deepened the problem. On the one hand, because it excluded Hungarians living there from acquiring land and therefore even the proverbial daily bread became a problem for the large number of Hungarian smallholders. On the other hand, the economic rise of the settlements established by the colonists was very slow and most of the farms created by the colonists were unviable without state subsidy. In practice, that meant that despite politicians’ ideas, legal regulations and various state support, problems did not diminish and the vast majority of farmers were still incapable of supporting their family from their own land.

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