Speech [The country's need for labor and effort, and the necessity of the revival of agriculture]

In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful

The fact that I can talk to you now- of course, you should put up for discussion your problem with the government later on- is that our agriculture has been alarmingly backward so far and it was completely destroyed in the name of land reform, and all of it was just chicanery. The Shah had taught everyone to play with words. In the ministries, there was chicanery; in agricultural industry, there was chicanery. There were rhetoric and chicanery everywhere. Nothing of reality was there. It was all distortion. That" guy" himself, was the best master in this distortion. And, of course, the" masters" would teach him that. All the affairs of the country were supposed to be governed by chicanery and deception. Regretfully, the agricultural affairs were the worst of all. They took the country of Iran to its ruination. A country whose one province (alone) would have sufficed to (feed the whole country) and the rest of its products could have been exported- to the point that it ended up in a place where it did in the name of" land reforms". This was done in such a way that it was in need of the America and others for everything. They caused utter failure of agriculture. But there were a lot of chicanery! He (the former Shah) repeatedly claimed that the country was going to be industrialized. This caused the emergence in Tehran of slums: shack dwellers, tent dwellers, and the like. The farmers wandered from their villages to the suburbs of the cities, Tehran in particular. And these disasters and afflictions ensued.

If, from now on, you want to continue relying on rhetoric, chicanery, and the like, it will be the same old story in the same old way. If we just intend to say," What we do; what we did," but in action we do not accomplish anything, it will be just like the former system. It will be the same old story of deceiving the people resulting in the same confusions (in the affairs). Today, what are needed are actions; not just words. We all should act. And the most important thing that should be accomplished in Iran is the revival of agriculture following its mortification and after its expiration.

Do not you tell me," What were we doing in the past years?" In the past years you were not able to do anything, or you just would not do it. Or, they would not let you do it. But now, you have the prerogative; from now on you have to think everything over. Whatever has happened has happened, and the blame for that capital sin falls on the shoulders of Muhammad Rida and his masters, who turned Iran into a market for the purchase of the wheat that they would usually dump into the sea or have them burnt until Iran was turned into a market for it. Those masters were plundering everything we owned and would kindly donate some of their wheat to us! From now on, you should be careful; wherever you are, and wherever we are, we all should be careful. This country which they ruined in every aspects of it for fifty odd years and in particular in the twenty odd years when a good son worthy only of his father reigned in this country and disturbed all the strata as he himself has this written in his book, A Mission for My Country! Of course, he is right when he writes that he had a mission on behalf of the Americans to do to this country what you see he did. And indeed he did. Up to now, everything has been in a shamble. Now, do not you say," What did we do in the past?" In the past, you did not do anything; you were not able to do anything, and therefore, we were defeated in agriculture more than in anything else.

Now you should have in mind to do away with the words, put away the rhetoric, and get into action. Put into action what you say. If you (really) want your country to be saved, anyone of you and wherever you are and any stratum, wherever they are and in whatever circumstances they are, now is the time for us all to act; you all should act to save the agriculture; the government should act to save the agriculture and act on other needs that the nation has. The farmers themselves should be ambitious enough to work so that this country is saved, and not that this country will be in need of America so as to get some wheat and barley. Or, being in need of Israel, from which country we were importing everything, even eggs! Our pastures, animal husbandry and stockbreeding failed because the pastures became" national," a term from their own glossary! They repeatedly prevented the people from going to the pastures and later on, it fell through; and that was the cause of our turning into a market for imported meat from abroad. They" nationalized" the forests and then they yielded them to certain persons or to other countries! And they gave the pastures to other individuals yet. They ruined everything we had. Now is the time for the nation of Iran to come to their senses, in the same way that they came to their senses and, considering that it should not be like the past, they overthrew the (old) system. And now that it is time for reconstruction, all the strata should make their effort to reconstruct. Everyone, and wherever he is, should work. The government should resolve the problems. Everyone should work. But in agriculture, those of you who have the expertise in such areas should attend to those professions. You should work; do not just talk. We need action; words are of no use. Talks won't be a substitute for wheat that man needs! The farmers should work and put the agriculture into motion. This stratum is ready; and the way I understand, if there is any flaw, it is focused on the higher strata. The lower strata are ready; in fact they are more than ready to serve, if they are left alone. Of course, there are now hands in the work not to allow the agriculture to move on and for the factories to be operational. We must confront them and challenge them. Today is the time for the nation of Iran to challenge those who do not let our country return to its normalcy and do not let our agriculture materialize and do not let the factories to operate, do not let the universities to move on with their mission, and are disturbing everything. Now is the time for all of you to fight all these strata. Guide the farmers not to accept them (in their circles) and especially among themselves. Those who approach them and discourage them to work and do not cultivate their farms, their intention is that they want the conditions to remain as it was in the past. You should guide them not to accept among themselves those strata that penetrate them and do false propaganda. They should drive them out of their village and from their locality so that they are able to perform their task.

At any rate, there are difficulties in everything. There are difficulties in agriculture and they should be removed. They should be removed by all the people's endeavor. You should not be disappointed. God willing, you will be able to do it. We can stand by our effort and reform our country; but those former less productive ones and those former unemployed, those former idlers, the ones that would sit in their offices doing nothing; this situation should be eliminated. A long and broad administration for an affair that does not require those services; or for a work that can be managed by ten people, they seated five hundred people there and paid them wages with no good cause! Our country's failure is because of these affairs. They brought up the lazy people so it is difficult for them to work. Just to sit in offices and smoke! Others have been brought up in this manner, too. Our agriculture has been disturbed. All of what we have are being disturbed. We should try to unite and reform these affairs. There are some difficulties that need to be reported to the government. And of course, we report the same to the government and it is their responsibilities to correct things. If you have some problems, it is upon them to resolve those problems. If it is possible, you submit your suggestions to my office in order for me to resolve the problem, if any; or if it is necessary that I remind the government, I will do that.

[After hearing the statements of one of the audience, Imam Khomeini stated:]

Well, if we can resolve these problems that you mentioned, write them down and submit it to this gentleman in order for me to see what it is, and if assistance is needed, we will send some of the clergymen there and God willing, necessary action will be taken.