Lithuania’s lost collective farms and the myth of the stolen roofing slate

A decades-old question—who destroyed Lithuania’s collective farms?—has become a symbol of post-independence discontent, blending folklore with frustration over the chaotic transition from Soviet-era agriculture, according to an investigation by LRT’s Buvo nebėra documentary team.

While collective farms, or kolūkiai, became obsolete after Lithuania regained independence in 1990, their collapse remains a contentious issue for some, tied to perceptions of injustice. The enduring metaphor of “stolen roofing slate” (pavogtas šiferis)—a reference to the material allegedly looted from abandoned farm buildings—has come to embody the disorder of the early 1990s.

Historian Dr. Antanas Terleckas, author of the study The Slate Case (Šiferio byla), told LRT that Soviet propaganda once portrayed collective farms as modernising forces, replacing “backward” rural life with mechanised efficiency. A 1961 propaganda film, Švyturys (The Lighthouse), typified this narrative, depicting a communist leader transplanting urban progress to a struggling village—beginning with the eradication of religious influence.

“It was about fetishising technology, urbanising the countryside, and positioning communists as the core of rural life,” Terleckas said. “The goal was to replace thatched roofs with slate, tractors with horse-drawn ploughs—anything motorised was inherently superior.”

Yet reality diverged sharply. Despite decades of Soviet efforts, forced collectivisation bred resentment, absenteeism, and inefficiency. By the late 1980s, even state reports acknowledged that private plots outproduced collective farms. Urbanisation accelerated: while 85% of Lithuanians lived in rural areas during the interwar period, by 1989 only around 40% remained in collective farms, Terleckas estimated.

The Sąjūdis reform movement, which drove Lithuania’s independence push, largely overlooked rural issues. “Sąjūdis was an urban organisation,” Terleckas noted. “Collective farms weren’t a priority—they weren’t a useful wedge issue.” With no clear plan, privatisation unfolded chaotically. Reports from 1989–1991 warned against hasty decisions, but some farm managers began dividing communal property among themselves—a practice that fuelled the “stolen slate” myth.

“There wasn’t much transparency,” Terleckas said. “The state apparatus was weak, and the process was ripe for exploitation.”

The collapse left rural Lithuania in limbo, a pattern Terleckas links to broader post-Soviet neglect: “The countryside was abandoned to inertia, just as it had been under Soviet rule. People, especially the young, fled to cities. The question remains: who even lives there now, and what do they want?”