Machine tractor station

The machine tractor station (MTS) (Ukrainian: Машинно-тракторна станція, romanized: Mashynno-traktorna stantsiia, Russian: машинно-тракторная станция, romanized: mashinno-traktornaya stantsiya, МТС) was a state enterprise for ownership and maintenance of agricultural machinery that were used in kolkhozy (collective farms operated by the government).

William Taubman, Khrushchev's biographer, describes them as follows:As the name implies, the MTSs were rural agencies that supplied collective farms with agricultural machinery and people to run it.

It was paid with the share of the agricultural product called natural payment (Russian: натуральная оплата, натуроплата, naturoplata).

75,000 tractors had been supplied by MTSs to Soviet collective farms by 1932,[2] and in 1933 the natural payment constituted about 20% of the product and continued to grow.

In 1972 they were further renamed into Regional Association "Selkhoztekhnika" (Russian: Сельхозтехника, an abbreviation for сельскохозяйственная техника, agricultural machinery).