Vneshposyltorg and Vneshtorgbank checks as a parallel currency of the USSR - id77. Foreign currency in the USSR USSR Foreign Trade Checks sell

It is well known what a heavy burden for the Soviet economy in 1979-89 the costs associated with the participation of the “limited contingent” were.

In addition to the official costs of Afghanistan in one form or another, the unofficial Afghan and near-Afghan economic system, which developed as a result of the presence of the Soviet military contingent in a foreign country, also had a certain influence on the economy of the Soviet Union.

Here we must remember the flow of goods that poured into the Union from the south. The bulk of them reached Soviet consumers in the suitcases of officers, soldiers and civilian specialists returning from an undeclared war, or in secluded places of withdrawn equipment. In turn, Soviet goods, which were in short supply there, were sent to Afghanistan in large quantities completely unofficially.

And where international trade takes place, its own currency system inevitably arises. Published memoirs of veterans of the undeclared war in Afghanistan allow us to get a certain idea about it.

Perhaps, Aleskender Ramazanov highlighted the “currency” side of the Afghan war in the most detail: “The monetary allowance of soldiers and sergeants for conscript service in Afghanistan was miserable and fluctuated between 20–40 rubles per month. Part of this amount was exchanged for VPT (Vneshposyltorg) checks. Despite the dire warnings, the check had nothing to do with currency. This surrogate ruble could be used to pay in Voentorg stores in the 40th Army or, until the beginning of 1989, on the territory of the USSR in “Berezka” currency stores.

Inexplicably, when exchanging the required amount, a serviceman was given two and a half checks for a ruble, and when wasting accountable check amounts, officers were charged four rubles for a check ruble - like in a library when a book is lost...

The essence was clarified by the “black market” in the Union, where a VPT check cost about three and a half rubles (close to the real exchange rate of the US dollar, contrary to the legend of the “buck” for sixty Soviet kopecks).

Officers and warrant officers, depending on their rank, position, and time of service in the DRA, received a double salary according to their position, from which from 45 to 150 rubles were deducted and exchanged for VPT checks. Accrual occurred daily, strictly in accordance with the number of days spent abroad. In 1981, junior officers received about 180 checks for a full month in the DRA, senior officers - 250. By the end of the Afghan campaign, this type of payment had almost doubled. Numbered stamps were placed on the 100 and 50 check bills; in theory, it was possible to trace from them where it came from to the “Afghans” or to the “non-Afghans” in the Union: in “Berezki” they demanded from buyers identity cards, international passports, military ID cards - sometimes even at the entrance to the store, not to mention the checkout. It didn't help! In the fight against smugglers and speculators, wide red stripes and threatening inscriptions about their special purpose for military trade appeared on checks. The miraculous properties of checks include the following: if an officer could pay a quarter of the cost of a Volga with checks, then he was allowed to purchase the car out of turn.

The “Afghans” loved VPT checks because they were easier to import into the USSR and safer to pay to the thieves of military property and socialist property. An excess of afghani (the currency of Afghanistan) could arouse suspicion in a serviceman, and the checks would be suspicious. Saved up! Friends chipped in!

And yet – the check was assigned and cancelled! In January 1989, towards the completion of the withdrawal of troops, the Beryozka stores closed and the check could be exchanged for Soviet rubles one-to-one at the army paymasters. This is such a currency substitute!
And since Afghan shopkeepers bought everything they could sell from Soviet soldiers and officers, they needed a lot of checks. Imagine their reaction to the checks being canceled!

“Normal people don’t do this,” the dukandor Ali-Muhammadi from Mazar-i-Sharif convinced the author of these lines. - The Shah has left. Daoud is gone - the paisa lives on. Taraki, Babrak - all the Afghanis are walking! What is your country? I canceled the money, right?” A panel of red-striped VPT checks decorated the northern wall of his dukan. However, the Afghans already had a lesson in 1917. They probably still have their chests covered with royal banknotes to this day. So, we haven’t learned...

As for the prices for consumer goods in military stores - “chekushki”, they approximately corresponded to the all-Union prices. In the “chekushkas” they immediately organized: “shortages”, issuance of goods with the permission of the unit commander, restrictions on “sales to one person”, bans on the sale of certain goods to soldiers and sergeants and a complete “bummer” for advisers! Sometimes they weren’t even allowed into the unit’s territory.

The display cases and shelves of the chekushki were filled with surrogates of fruit juices from Yugoslavia, dry biscuits, candies, and Chinese canned meat. Tracksuits, “diplomat” suitcases, and tape recorders from Japan and Germany were sold as “recordings.” Zi-zi lemonade was considered a luxury, which, however, was called “sisi,” with the emphasis on the first syllable, of course. By the time the troops were withdrawn, when a considerable amount of checks had accumulated in the hands of the military personnel, the “checks” mysteriously became empty.

Check bills were 100, 50, 10, 5, 1 ruble and 50, 10, 1 kopeck. For a penny you could buy a box of matches or an unstamped envelope. After being accepted at the store, the checks were canceled (they cut a triangle around the edge).

During all the years of the Afghan campaign, there was a categorical ban on the purchase of goods in local stores (dukans), and therefore, everything that was not purchased in “checks” could be confiscated on “legal grounds.” This affected officers less, and a soldier could be stripped naked before being sent home - to a unit, at a transit point or at customs. Which happened constantly and everywhere. Shmon is an immortal thing!

But this was a wise political and ideological decision: how can you bring something sensible from an undeveloped country, which we have undertaken to help everyone, even flesh and blood? The topic of money remained rather dryly and stingily in the memory of the veterans. Far from being a decisive factor for a Soviet soldier of those times.”

It’s not entirely clear why the author dates the closure of Berezok to January 1989? Usually January 1988 is mentioned, not 1989. In early January 1988, the USSR Government announced the liquidation of the trading system for checks, during the campaign “to fight privileges” and “for social justice.” At the same time, huge queues arose - the owners of the checks tried by any means to get rid of them before the announced closure date.

But one cannot but agree with the fact that the financial factor was not decisive for Soviet soldiers and officers of those times. But their willingness to serve their country and fight wherever they were ordered, in incredibly difficult conditions, was too shamelessly exploited.

Magic officer's hat

Here is a description of how officers who recently arrived in Afghanistan received their first practical lesson in Afghan currency management, made by helicopter flight technician Igor Frolov:

“When drowsiness began to fall on the silent flight technicians, two Afghan soldiers from the airfield security approached the board. We poked our heads through the door and examined the interior, looking under the benches.

- Jam, sweets, liver? – asked the tall one.
“No, nothing, we haven’t earned it yet,” Lieutenant Molotilkin threw up his hands.
- This! - one soldier pointed to the winter hat of flight engineer F., lying on the additional tank.
– What about the keys to the apartment? - said flight engineer F.

Suddenly, behind the Afghan army soldier, a black-haired captain of the Soviet army appeared. The flight technicians did not hear the Toyota drive up - it dropped off the passengers at the checkpoint so that the two majors could meet the head of the airfield, Colonel Sattar, and the captain went to the sides.

- What, are you afraid to sell your honor? - he asked Lieutenant F. - So honor, she’s wearing a cockade, but the cockade is no longer there. A man, not to mention a military officer, must have money...

The first days, until they were uniformed, flight engineer F. walked around in his gray-blue officer’s hat, having removed his golden cockade - the field uniform should not have any unmasking parts that glitter in the sun.

- Nahzmi noise, dust? – the captain asked the soldier.
- Hub! - said the soldier, smiling white-toothed at the Russian giant.

The captain went up to the cabin, took flight engineer F.’s hat, and showed it to the soldier:

- Du hazor?
“No,” the soldier shook his head. - Khazor...
– What about winter in the mountains? - said the captain. – Your brother dushmans are cold, however...
- Dushman is the enemy! – the soldier said smiling.
“Okay, brother of the enemy,” said Rosenquit, “yak khazor panch sad!” - and he thrust his hat into the soldier’s hands.

He immediately put it on his head, took out a thin packet from his bosom, peeled off a few bills and gave it to the captain.
The captain opened a bag made of orange percale, in which, judging by the protruding edges, packs of afghans were packed, put the soldier’s money in it, took out a bill of fifty Vneshposyltorg checks from his pocket and handed it to the flight technician F.

- What is this? - Flight engineer F asked, amazed at the speed of selling his hat.
“This is the first lesson in the free market and illegal currency transactions,” the captain said. – A hat that costs eleven rubles in Voentorg, and is also very second-hand, was sold for one and a half thousand afoshki to a friendly Afghan warrior, for whom a warm thing in winter is more necessary than Montana jeans, which you can buy in a local dukan for the same one and a half thousand. So that you understand your gain, I gave you checks at the rate of one to thirty. In the Union, these half a hundred checks will be exchanged for you near the Beryozka one in three for 150 rubles, that is, your profit will be more than a thousand percent...

“This is some kind of nonsense...” flight engineer Molotilkin said admiringly. - It turns out that if I brought a hundred of these hats here, I could buy a Volga in the Union?

“You can buy a Volga by spinning a box of vodka correctly,” the captain laughed. – But this is a question of import and export, you will understand later. By the way, for these half a hundred checks you can buy a bottle of vodka here, and at the Tashkent airport you need to put that much in your passport at the ticket office so that they can then sell you a ticket home for rubles. Such are the paradoxes.

Flight engineer F. was amazed by this simple but powerful market mathematics. True, he was embarrassed by the fact that he so unprincipledly allowed his own hat, doused in jelly in the dining room, scorched by the stove of the squadron's house at the Amur airfield, kerosene, which had served him as a pillow so many times, to be given into the wrong hands... He suddenly felt that he had sold his little sister, and he felt ashamed. And it’s even scary - I remembered my grandmother’s remarks - “don’t wave your hat - you’ll get a headache” or “don’t throw your hat anywhere - you’ll forget your head.” Isn't this a sign that he will leave his stupid and greedy head here?

To distract himself, he began to think about how, upon returning to the base, he would go to the “chekushka”, where the saleswoman Lyuda, nicknamed Globus, would sell him a carton of Java cigarettes, a bottle of cherry Donna, a pack of cookies, a box of chocolates and, probably, a can of crabs . And then he will go to the bookstore and buy a black two-volume copy of Lorca so that, after closing on board after dinner, he can read, lying on a bench, about the moon over Cordoba, smoke, flick the ashes out of the open porthole, and wash it down with Donna...”

Before the eyes of flight technician F., a winter hat, which cost 11 rubles in the military store, was very second-hand (that is, used), doused in jelly and kerosene-lined, turned into 50 precious checks. As the old-time captain quite rightly noted, a warm thing in winter is more necessary than Montana jeans. Who in the then Soviet Union would have understood this? An unfortunate tattered hat - and a precious "Montana". How many dramatic stories happened at that time due to the lack of this most coveted “Montana” from a guy or a girl... And then the hat is the equivalent of “Montana”. Afghan currency fiction, incomprehensible to ordinary citizens of the USSR.

There were no coins (paper checks were even for 1 kopeck). Vneshtorgbank checks were used to pay salaries to Soviet citizens working abroad: mainly specialists working under USSR construction contracts, as well as specialists (for example, teachers, doctors and military advisers) working under contracts with foreign public and private institutions (hospitals, universities, etc.) .), as well as sailors, ordinary embassy employees and other persons within the USSR who received fees or transfers in foreign currency.

The main purpose of introducing certificates, and later VTB checks, was the desire of the Soviet state to limit foreign currency expenses on the salaries of citizens working abroad (especially in capitalist countries, where employees would otherwise withdraw their entire salary in foreign currency and spend it all locally), as well as reduce the influx of private clothing imports into the country from uncontrolled sources. During their stay abroad, part of the salary of foreign workers in foreign currency was voluntarily (but not more than 60%) transferred to an account at Vnesheconombank, from which it was possible to receive a pre-ordered amount on the spot (usually through an economic adviser at the USSR Embassy) or upon return to the USSR in the form of certificates (later - checks). Certain categories of foreign workers of foreign trade organizations and diplomats could import into the USSR a limited amount of foreign currency, which they were obliged to convert into certificates (checks) no later than the established deadline, otherwise their possession of the currency was also considered illegal.

Certificates (for sailors “bonds”) appeared in 1964. Previously, on the third floor of GUM and in the Central Department Store there was a so-called system. “closed special departments” where foreign workers or their relatives were given items ordered in advance from catalogs. The system was extremely cumbersome and practically did not allow the sale of small consumer goods (for example, it was impossible to exchange shoes for a suitable size). As a result, a more flexible system of Vnesheconombank certificates was introduced. They existed of three types: “certificates with a blue stripe” - paid to citizens who worked in the CMEA countries (credit ratio 1:1); “certificates with a yellow stripe” - were paid to foreign workers who worked in countries with non-convertible currencies, that is, in the third world, for example, India, African countries, etc. (ratio 4.6: 1) and “stripeless certificates” - were paid to those who worked in countries with SLE (ratio 4.6:1). Thus, “yellow-striped” and “stripeless” certificates were secretly a physical analogue of the conditionally countable foreign currency “golden” ruble, performing the quasi-function of “Soviet chervonets”, but, unlike their predecessors, they were not in official circulation in wide circulation and in the hands of persons not able to document a legal source of origin were equated to foreign currency, the possession of which was criminally punishable for Soviet citizens (Article 88 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR).

Certificates and coupons (later checks) could be legally purchased exclusively in the network of special stores - “Beryozki”, in addition, they could be made as a contribution to the housing cooperative, but only at a ratio of 1: 1 to the regular ruble, which was also an additional item state income. The essence of the certificate system was that foreign workers in different countries, with formally comparable salaries (close to the Union average), actually received salaries that differed significantly in purchasing power. For example, the salary of a Soviet translator in India, which was conventionally 200 rubles, was actually 920 rubles in the “yellow stripe certificates”, and the salary of a translator, for example, in Hungary, was 400 rubles. in “blue stripe certificates” was the same 400 rubles. Accordingly, in Beryozka they sold not only clothes, carpets, crystal and other consumer goods produced by CMEA for blue and yellow striped certificates, but also cars.
And in exchange for “bandless certificates”, high-quality imported consumer goods were also sold, including Western audio and video equipment and scarce food products. The difference in the purchasing power of certificates was especially clear in the example of passenger cars:

• "Volga" GAZ-21 cost 5.5 thousand rubles. in “blue stripes” and only 1.2 thousand in “no stripes” and “yellow stripes”;
• “Moskvich-408”, respectively 4.5 thousand and about 1.0 thousand;
• “Zaporozhets” - 3.5 thousand and 700 rubles.

Such obvious inequality led to the accumulation of discontent among ordinary foreign workers and created a field for “speculative operations”, that is, exchanges of certificates of different types “among others,” as well as a “black market” that operated despite a strict ban on such operations (for a period of up to 8 years according to Article 88 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR), where the exchange rate of certificates to the Soviet ruble in the early 70s was 1: 1.5-2 for “blue stripes”, 1: 6-7 for “yellow stripes” and 1: 8-9 for “no stripes” " By the way, for senior diplomatic employees (from the level of adviser and above) there were separate certificates of type “D”, which were accepted for payment on a par with cash currency from foreigners in a parallel system of currency stores - “Beryozki”.

Thus, in the USSR there were two completely separate (check and currency) trading systems of stores (in the RSFSR - “Beryozka”, in the Ukrainian SSR - “Kashtan”, and in the Latvian SSR - “Dzintars”). Only foreigners, diplomats and the highest party nomenklatura could legally shop in currency stores. Ordinary foreign workers had to use only check “Beryozki”, which in turn were closed to other Soviet citizens who had only Soviet rubles.

The majority of ordinary Soviet foreign workers regularly transferred a significant portion of their salaries abroad to the accounts of Vnesheconombank, which was facilitated by strict customs restrictions on the import of durable goods into the USSR by private individuals, as well as the sale exclusively for checks of such prestigious and scarce goods as Volga cars. With a significant expansion in the 70s in the number of citizens traveling abroad to work and to simplify the operation of the Beryozka system, in 1974 certificates of all types were replaced by “Vneshtorgbank checks” of a single type.

When receiving money transfers from abroad, they necessarily passed through Vneshtorgbank and within the USSR were also issued by checks, and not in the original currency.

Officially, checks for ordinary Soviet rubles were not exchanged (they could only be counted at a rate of 1:1 when making payments for housing cooperatives or a garage), and the black market rate ranged from 1:1.5-2 (in the late 70s) to 1:3 ( in the second half of the 80s), which, however, did not prevent this type of “shadow business” in Moscow and Leningrad from expanding into a mass socio-economic phenomenon by the mid-80s, and also gave rise to a new criminal specialty of “check breakers” ( that is, swindlers who deceived foreign workers during the exchange by handing them “dolls” instead of ruble cash). Since during such trade, foreign workers and persons equated to them committed a criminal act, the police usually did not receive complaints about scammers, and besides, many of the “comrades” assigned to “Beryozki” to monitor order were themselves already in the share of the scrappers.

Elimination of "Birches"

These negative phenomena became known to the general public during the Glasnost era, causing a massive “wave of indignation”, not so much by the fact of the existence of “Berezok”, but by the difference in the actual wages of “simple drillers in the Karakum and Sahara.” As a result, the system of trading for cash checks in Beryozka stores was recognized by the leadership of the USSR as socially unfair, and at the beginning of 1988 it was liquidated (this was done, among other things, with the aim of diverting public attention from the nomenklatura special distributors and masking the general deterioration in the state of Soviet trade after the introduction of " Prohibition"). This liquidation was accompanied by rush demand - all goods were swept away from the shelves of Beryozok (often with overpayments to store employees), for which long lines lined up overnight - the lack of clear information from the Soviet leadership created the impression that check deposits were being canceled (zeroed) altogether.

As a result, the former check Beryozka stores switched to a much less convenient cashless trading system for customers (payment for goods issued in the store had to be made directly at the bank by non-cash transfer of the cost of the goods from a personal account to the store’s account, that is, the “special departments” system was actually revived) , operating until 1964), but foreign exchange These changes did not affect Beryozka stores.

CMEA countries

A similar check system existed in all CMEA countries, for example, coupons in Czechoslovakia and Poland, checks in the GDR, points in the BPR, etc.

see also

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• Stages of a long journey: from blackmail to checks of Vneshtorgbank of the USSR

Checks of Vneshtorgbank (Bank for Foreign Trade of the USSR) and Vneshposyltorg (formerly “certificates” and “bonds”)- a kind of “parallel currency” that existed in the USSR in 1964-1988. They were issued in the form of banknotes; there were no coins (paper checks were even for 1 kopeck). Vneshtorgbank checks were used to pay salaries to Soviet citizens working abroad: mainly specialists working under USSR construction contracts, as well as specialists (for example, teachers, doctors and military advisers) working under contracts with foreign public and private institutions (hospitals, universities, etc.) .), as well as sailors, ordinary embassy employees and other persons within the USSR who received fees or transfers in foreign currency.
The main purpose of introducing certificates, and later VTB checks, was the desire of the Soviet state to save on foreign exchange costs for the salaries of fellow citizens, especially in countries with capitalist economies (in which otherwise fellow workers would have withdrawn their entire salary in foreign currency and spent it all locally), as well as to reduce influx of private clothing imports into the country from uncontrolled sources. During their stay abroad, part of the salary of foreign workers in foreign currency was voluntarily (but not more than 60%)* transferred to an account at Vnesheconombank, from which it was possible to receive a pre-ordered amount in the form of certificates (later checks).

In principle, some categories of foreign workers of foreign trade organizations and diplomats could import into the USSR a limited amount of hard currency, which they were still obliged to exchange for certificates (checks) no later than the established period, otherwise their possession of currency was also considered illegal.

Certificates (for sailors “bonds”) appeared in 1964. Previously, on the third floor of GUM and in the Central Department Store there was a so-called system. “closed special departments” where foreign workers or their relatives were given items ordered in advance from catalogs. The system was extremely cumbersome and practically did not allow the sale of small consumer goods (for example, it was impossible to exchange shoes for a suitable size). As a result, a more flexible system of Vnesheconombank certificates was introduced. They existed of three types: “certificates with a blue stripe” - paid to citizens who worked in the CMEA countries (credit ratio 1:1); “certificates with a yellow stripe” - were paid to foreign workers who worked in countries with non-convertible currencies, that is, in the third world, for example, India, African countries, etc. (ratio 4.6: 1) and “stripeless certificates” - were paid to those who worked in countries with SLE (ratio 4.6:1). Thus
“yellow-striped” and “stripeless” certificates were secretly a physical analogue of the conditionally countable foreign currency “golden” ruble, performing the quasi-function of “Soviet chervonets”, but unlike their predecessors, they were not in official circulation in wide circulation and were in the hands of persons who could not document the legality source of origin were equated to foreign currency, the possession of which was criminally punishable for Soviet citizens (Article 88 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR).

Certificates and coupons (later checks) could be legally purchased exclusively from all-specialty stores - “Beryozki”, in addition, they could be made as a contribution to the housing cooperative, but only at a ratio of 1: 1 to the ordinary (“wooden”) ruble, which also was an additional source of state income. The essence of the certificate system was that foreign workers in different countries, with formally comparable salaries (close to the Union average), actually received salaries that differed significantly in purchasing power. For example, the salary of a Soviet translator in India was approximately 200 rubles. actually in “yellow stripe certificates”
was 920 rubles, and the salary of a translator, for example, in Hungary, was 400 rubles. in “blue stripe certificates” was the same 400 rubles. Accordingly, in “Beryozka” only clothes, carpets, crystal and other consumer goods of domestic and CMEA production, but also cars were sold for blue and yellow striped certificates. And in exchange for “bandless certificates”, high-quality imported consumer goods were also sold, including Western audio equipment and scarce food products. The difference in the purchasing power of certificates was especially obvious in the example of passenger cars, for example, a Volga GAZ-21 cost 5.5 thousand rubles. in “blue stripes” and only 1.2 thousand in “no stripes” and “yellow stripes”; “Moskvich-408”, respectively 4.5 thousand and about 1.0 thousand, and “Zaporozhets” - 3.5 thousand and 700 rubles. Such obvious inequality led to the accumulation of discontent among ordinary foreign workers and created a field for “speculative operations”, that is, exchanges of certificates of different types “among others,” as well as a “black market” that operated despite a strict ban on such operations (for a period of up to 8 years according to Article 88 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR), where the rate of certificates to the “wooden” ruble in the early 70s was 1: 1.5-2 for “blue stripes”, 1: 6-7 for “yellow stripes” and 1: 8-9 for "bandless". By the way, for senior diplomatic employees (from the level of adviser and above) there were separate certificates of type “D”, which were accepted for payment on the same basis as cash currency from foreigners in a parallel system of currency stores - “Beryozki”.

Thus, in the USSR, under one sign, two completely separate (check and currency) trading systems of Beryozka stores existed in parallel. By the way, in a number of cities of the USSR the name could be different, for example, in Odessa, check stores were called “Kashtan”, and in Riga - “Dzintars”. Only foreigners, diplomats and the highest party nomenklatura could legally shop in foreign currency stores. Ordinary foreign workers had to use only check “Beryozki”, which in turn were closed to other Soviet citizens who had only Soviet rubles.

The majority of ordinary Soviet workers abroad regularly transferred a significant part of their salaries abroad to the accounts of Vnesheconombank, which was facilitated by strict customs restrictions on the import of durable goods into the USSR by private individuals, for example, the import of stereo systems, etc., was quantitatively limited, as well as sales exclusively for receipts for such prestigious and scarce goods as Volga cars. With a significant expansion in the 70s in the number of fellow citizens traveling abroad to work and to “simplify” the work of the Beryozka system, in 1974 certificates of all types were replaced by “Vneshtorgbank checks” of a single type.

When receiving money transfers from abroad (for example, royalties for works published in the West or assistance from relatives living abroad), they necessarily passed through Vneshtorgbank and within the USSR were also issued by checks, and not in the original currency.

Officially, checks for ordinary Soviet rubles were not exchanged (they could only be counted at a rate of 1:1 when making payments for housing cooperatives or a garage), and the black market rate ranged from 1:1.5-2 (in the late 70s) to 1:10 ( in the second half of the 80s), which, however, did not prevent this type of “shadow business” in Moscow and Leningrad from expanding into a mass socio-economic phenomenon by the mid-80s, and also gave rise to a new criminal specialty of “check breakers”, that is, swindlers who deceived foreign workers during the exchange by handing them “dolls” instead of ruble cash. Since foreign workers and persons equated to them committed a criminal act by the very fact of a private exchange, the police usually did not receive complaints about scammers, and besides, many of the “comrades” assigned to “Beryozki” to monitor order were themselves already in the share of the scrappers.

These negative phenomena became known to the general public during the Glasnost era, causing a massive “wave of indignation”, not so much by the fact of the existence of “Berezok”, but by the difference in the actual wages of “ordinary drillers in the Karakum and Sahara.” As a result, the system of trading for cash checks in Beryozka stores was recognized by the nomenklatura elite of the CPSU and the USSR as “socially unfair” and liquidated in 1988 in order to divert public attention from the nomenklatura “special distributors” and to mask the general deterioration in the state of Soviet trade after the introduction of Prohibition " As a result, the former Beryozka check stores switched to a much less convenient “bank transfer” trading system for customers, but these changes did not affect the Beryozka currency stores in any way, when payment for goods issued in the store had to be made directly to bank by non-cash transfer of the cost of goods from a personal account to a store account (that is, the system of “special departments” that was in force until 1964 was actually revived).

In the spring of 1991, a “market exchange rate” for the ruble was introduced in the USSR and at the same time the regime for the circulation of cash currency was softened (although Article 88 was not formally repealed), the first official currency exchange points appeared, and in 1993 the check accounts of foreign workers at Vnesheconombank were converted into SCV.

Let me remind you that the products presented (not all, but many) could not be purchased on the open market. And what was in the capital's stores was noticeably more expensive than in this catalogue. In it, the prices are slyly indicated in rubles, but we are talking about checks from the veshposyltorg or foreign currency rubles. The point was that our specialists working abroad were paid not in foreign currency, but in these very rubles. And they could buy them in our stores, exchanging them for such a thrill as in this catalogue. Or buy jeans, a radio, cassettes there...

I remember pasta in boxes like these. Not much of a shortage. But there were no Italian ones. Surprisingly they are about the same price...
The same can be said about coffee. The price was not determined by the market, not by demand. Same weight - get the same price. Naturally, the imported one was much more scarce. However, we weren’t even in the provinces; they were brought from Moscow.

Of interest is the offer of alcoholic beverages. These dry Georgian wines were in stores and were not in demand. Sometimes they were taken if suddenly there were no secured ones. They drank, made faces, called sour meat and compote.

Portuguese and Spanish wines are good. And even more so for this price. And pay attention to the price of Soviet Champagne. Of course, it is unreasonably overpriced. But this gave rise to the myth about the excellent quality and terrible demand abroad for this product. That is, for foreigners the price was increased, and, say, sailors, having bought it in a regular store, exchanged this product for any consumer goods. In addition to champagne, this group included watches, cameras...

Cinzano and Martini were offered at the same price. And this price for ’83 was 3 rubles. Special ones) At the same time, we often drank the same vermouth, buying it in Torgmortrans stores. And it was a lower class vermouth. Hungarian "Kecskemet", "Carmen", Bulgarian "Marka". And they all cost 4 rubles per liter bottle.

Imported canned beer at one price, according to the wonderful Soviet tradition))

Oh, what wonderful bottles... Exactly, the grass was greener before)

And this is the holy of holies - sausage. This could cause a Soviet person to have a nervous breakdown)

At the same time, the assortment according to today’s standards is quite meager. But then it seemed that this was simply unheard of abundance...

Black caviar is five times more expensive than red caviar

It seems normal now. Today the black one is about 20 times more expensive... But then, it seemed savage. At that time, we easily bought black caviar from barkoshes, I don’t remember the price, but it was quite affordable. Red, on the contrary, was something exquisite, not very accessible)

The real poverty of the assortment is clearly visible in the choice of cheeses. Soviet, Dutch, Swiss...Yes, they were not bad, and even more so. But can this be compared with any modern supermarket? "Friendship", "Amber"...))

And let's return to alcohol again. Armenian cognac three stars for 2.50! Oh, if only! We took it for 10, if we were lucky. They sorted it out quickly.

I'm not even talking about prices in France. Well done, they write as it sounds - Ennessy. Now they would write Hennessey)

But Camus Napoleon was in Moscow stores for 50 rubles per bottle. An exorbitant price for a Soviet person. It’s a completely different matter - 17 rubles)

In 1983, we bought Russian vodka for 5-30 per bottle with a cap, and 5-50 for a bottle with a screw. For diplomats the same cost was 1-43...

The prices for cigarettes are very interesting. In 1983, Marlboro, Camel, and Winston began to appear in our stores... They all cost a ruble per pack, and a little later at 1-50.
Today the market has distributed all these brands into different price groups. The pricing in foreign trade is curious. All imported cigarettes of standard length cost 40 kopecks. per pack, and 100 mm - 45))

Well, and finally, so that the workers do not have illusions, Vneshposyltorg explains that the presented goods are not intended for them, the mob, but for foreign diplomats

More interesting pages from the catalog...

). Vneshtorgbank checks were used to pay salaries to Soviet citizens working abroad: mainly specialists working under USSR construction contracts, as well as specialists (for example, teachers, doctors and military advisers) working under contracts with foreign public and private institutions (hospitals, universities, etc.) .), as well as sailors, ordinary embassy employees and other persons within the USSR who received fees or transfers in foreign currency.

The main purpose of introducing certificates, and later VTB checks, was the desire of the Soviet state to limit foreign currency expenses on the salaries of citizens working abroad (especially in capitalist countries, where employees would otherwise withdraw their entire salary in foreign currency and spend it all locally), as well as reduce the influx of private clothing imports into the country from uncontrolled sources. During their stay abroad, part of the salary of foreign workers in foreign currency was voluntarily (but not more than 60%)* transferred to an account at Vnesheconombank, from which it was possible to receive the pre-ordered amount in the form of certificates (later - checks). Certain categories of foreign workers of foreign trade organizations and diplomats could import into the USSR a limited amount of foreign currency, which they were obliged to convert into certificates (checks) no later than the established deadline, otherwise their possession of the currency was also considered illegal.

Certificates (for sailors “bonds”) appeared in 1964. Previously, on the third floor of GUM and in the Central Department Store there was a so-called system. “closed special departments” where foreign workers or their relatives were given items ordered in advance from catalogs. The system was extremely cumbersome and practically did not allow the sale of small consumer goods (for example, it was impossible to exchange shoes for a suitable size). As a result, a more flexible system of Vnesheconombank certificates was introduced. They existed of three types: “certificates with a blue stripe” - paid to citizens who worked in the CMEA countries (credit ratio 1:1); “certificates with a yellow stripe” - were paid to foreign workers who worked in countries with non-convertible currencies, that is, in the third world, for example, India, African countries, etc. (coefficient 4.6:1) and “bandless certificates” - were paid to those working in countries with hard currency (coefficient 4.6:1). Thus, “yellow-striped” and “stripeless” certificates were secretly a physical analogue of the conditionally countable foreign currency “golden” ruble, performing the quasi-function of “Soviet chervonets”, but, unlike their predecessors, they were not in official circulation in wide circulation and in the hands of persons not able to document a legal source of origin were equated to foreign currency, the possession of which was criminally punishable for Soviet citizens (Article 88 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR).

Certificates and coupons (later checks) could be legally purchased exclusively in the network of special stores - “Beryozki”, in addition, they could be made as a contribution to the housing cooperative, but only at a ratio of 1:1 to the regular ruble, which was also an additional item state income. The essence of the certificate system was that foreign workers in different countries, with formally comparable salaries (close to the Union average), actually received salaries that differed significantly in purchasing power. For example, the salary of a Soviet translator in India, which was conventionally 200 rubles, was actually 920 rubles in the “yellow stripe certificates”, and the salary of a translator, for example, in Hungary, was 400 rubles. in “blue stripe certificates” was the same 400 rubles. Accordingly, in Beryozka only clothes, carpets, crystal and other consumer goods produced by CMEA, but also cars, were sold for blue and yellow striped certificates. And in exchange for “bandless certificates”, high-quality imported consumer goods were also sold, including Western audio equipment and scarce food products. The difference in the purchasing power of certificates was especially obvious in the example of passenger cars, for example, a Volga GAZ-21 cost 5.5 thousand rubles. in “blue stripes” and only 1.2 thousand in “no stripes” and “yellow stripes”; “Moskvich-408”, respectively 4.5 thousand and about 1.0 thousand, and “Zaporozhets” - 3.5 thousand and 700 rubles. Such obvious inequality led to the accumulation of discontent among ordinary foreign workers and created a field for “speculative operations”, that is, exchanges of certificates of different types “among others,” as well as a “black market” that operated despite a strict ban on such operations (for a period of up to 8 years according to Article 88 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR), where the exchange rate of certificates to the Soviet ruble in the early 70s was 1: 1.5-2 for “blue stripes”, 1: 6-7 for “yellow stripes” and 1: 8-9 for “no stripes” " By the way, for senior diplomatic employees (from the level of adviser and above) there were separate certificates of type “D”, which were accepted for payment on a par with cash currency from foreigners in a parallel system of currency stores - “Beryozki”.

Thus, in the USSR there were two completely separate (check and currency) trading systems of stores (in the RSFSR - “Beryozka”, in the Ukrainian SSR - “Kashtan”, and in the Latvian SSR - “Dzintars”). Only foreigners, diplomats and the highest party nomenklatura could legally shop in currency stores. Ordinary foreign workers had to use only check “Beryozki”, which in turn were closed to other Soviet citizens who had only Soviet rubles.

The majority of ordinary Soviet foreign workers regularly transferred a significant portion of their salaries abroad to Vnesheconombank accounts, which was facilitated by strict customs restrictions on the import of durable goods into the USSR by private individuals, as well as the sale exclusively for checks of such prestigious and scarce goods as Volga cars. With a significant expansion in the 70s in the number of citizens traveling abroad to work and to simplify the operation of the Beryozka system, in 1974 certificates of all types were replaced by “Vneshtorgbank checks” of a single type.

When receiving money transfers from abroad, they necessarily passed through Vneshtorgbank and within the USSR were also issued by checks, and not in the original currency.

Officially, checks for ordinary Soviet rubles were not exchanged (they could only be counted at a rate of 1:1 when making payments for housing cooperatives or a garage), and the black market rate ranged from 1:1.5-2 (in the late 70s) to 1:10 ( in the second half of the 80s), which, however, did not prevent this type of “shadow business” in Moscow and Leningrad from expanding into a mass socio-economic phenomenon by the mid-80s, and also gave rise to a new criminal specialty of “check breakers”, that is, swindlers who deceived foreign workers during the exchange by handing them “dolls” instead of ruble cash. Since foreign workers and persons equated to them committed a criminal act, the police usually did not receive complaints about scammers, moreover, many of the “comrades” assigned to “Beryozki” to monitor order were themselves already in the share of the scrappers.

These negative phenomena became known to the general public during the era of glasnost, causing a massive “wave of indignation”, not so much by the fact of the existence of “Berezok”, but by the difference in the actual wages of “ordinary drillers in the Karakum and Sahara.” As a result, the system of trading for cash checks in Beryozka stores was recognized by the leadership of the USSR as socially unfair and liquidated in 1988 in order to divert public attention from the nomenklatura “special distributors” and to mask the general deterioration in the state of Soviet trade after the introduction of Prohibition. As a result, the former Beryozka check stores switched to a much less convenient “bank transfer” trading system for customers, but these changes did not affect the Beryozka currency stores in any way, when payment for goods issued in the store had to be made directly to bank by non-cash transfer of the cost of goods from a personal account to a store account (that is, the system of “special departments” that was in force until 1964 was actually revived).

In the spring of 1991, a “market exchange rate” for the ruble was introduced in the USSR and at the same time the regime for the circulation of cash currency was softened (although Article 88 was not formally repealed), the first official currency exchange points appeared, and in 1993 the check accounts of foreign workers at Vnesheconombank were converted into SCV.

Polish bond

CMEA countries

Similar checks existed in all CMEA countries, for example, bonds in Czechoslovakia and Poland, checks in the GDR, etc.

Links

• Stages of a long journey: from blackmail to checks of Vneshtorgbank of the USSR