"For the first time, the

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deepen the agrarian reform and, on the other hand, the needs of the people have pressured us to act."

Wheelock continued, "An efficient producer has other means of sustenance, but 500 peasant families do not. We prefer to respond to the needs of the 500 peasant families even though, after the imperialist aggression has ended, we may revise the current measures" (Pensamiento Propio, Managua, January-February 1986).

Since the January agrarian reform decree, the gov -ernment has announced several new distributions of land totalling over 200,000 acres. In Region V alone, 40,000 acres have already been turned over to the poor peasants. An additional 135,000 acres are to be distributed before the end of the year in this region.

Half this redistributed land, however, is to come from the "unproductive" state-owned farms. These are farms that have received little technical aid or credit from the state and have not met their production goals.

The Sandinista government is committed to maintaining the mixed economy and has therefore opposed parceling out the lands of the large capitalist producers. But by dismembering these state farms, thousands of agricultural workers are being forced to relocate to other crowded state farms or to leave their jobs altogether.

And, although the government has promised to make more land available to the landless peasants, there is still discontent in certain regions with the pace of redis -tribution.

In March, for example, hundreds of peasants marched in Masaya, waving placards listing the names of big landlords. They were demanding that the new reform law be implemented rapidly so as to give them the land before the next crop cycle. The pro-Sandinista National Union of Farmers and Ranchers (UNAG) has proposed a list of 21 estates in the Masaya area that should be taken over and parceled out to the poor peasants.

On May 5, Barricada, the official paper of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN), explained that land occupations were also continuing to take place in the Masaya region. "There are more demands for land by the campesinos than there is land to be distributed," Barricada noted. It is estimated that 20,000 peasant families in the region want land.

Barricada quoted Roberto Coronel, vice minister of agrarian reform, who warned against further illegal land occupations. "The peasants who want land must respect the laws that the revolution has created to give them the land," Coronel stated. "We must not forget that in Nicaragua there exists a mixed economy." because of their "organized and conscious participation in the affairs of the factory." The motto of the workers at Induquinisa was "Participation is the motor of productivity."

Barricada pointed to the problems the government faces as it tries to motivate workers to produce more and better. These include the "excessive centralist and hierarchical methods of administration" in the state sector; the arrogance and resistance of the "privileged private sector;" and the overall low degree of parti -cipation of the workers, who "don't know the political importance, the costs, or the destination of their production."

While it is clear that the Sandinista government is committed to overcoming these obstacles, many deeper problems seem to lie embedded in the economic system Representatives of unions on a given company's production council must function within the framework established by the government, and their major goal, as they see it, is to ensure that the production goals are met.

They can point out violations of the labor code and abuses or corruption by the administration-which are not infrequent. And they can adjust production quotas. But beyond this, their role is actually quite limited. [See interview with Jose Adan Rivera in this section.] Still, the recent shift toward what Barricada calls new "relations of production" is very positive. To move ahead, however, will require that the state overcome all the obstacles created by the private sector, with the working-class and mass organizations becoming the fundamental decision-making bodies of the state.

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land of the large capitalists."