Student construction brigades

Kazakh SSR. The summer of 1978. More than hundred thousand students from all over the USSR arrive in Central Kazakhstan to participate in virgin lands campaign. They all are involved in the movement of student construction brigades. The idea of creating these brigades belonged to the students who responded to the call of the authorities to develop virgin lands in Kazakhstan. Patrice Lumumba People’s Friendship University of Moscow students were among them. The foreigners developing virgin lands were photographed for news agency. All of them are wearing construction brigade uniforms.

This photo taken in 1958 reminds us how the all-union construction brigade movement was born. Leningrad students are seen off to the virgin lands campaign. Their peers from Moscow State University are also ready to depart to North Kazakhstan.