Produgol

(Company for Trade in Mineral Fuel of the Donets Coal Basin), the largest monopoly in the prerevolutionary Russian mining industry.

Organized by French and Belgian capitalists as a joint-stock company in May 1904, Produgol’ began operations in 1906. The company controlled the large coal enterprises of the Donets Coal Basin, most of which belonged to French and Belgian entrepreneurs. Its directing body was based in Paris and was referred to as the Paris Committee. The company included 11 enterprises in 1906 and 24 by the end of 1909; during that period its share of the output of Donets coal rose from more than 40 percent to 60 percent. Relations among the participating enterprises were defined by contracts that set the amount to be produced and sold and established the conditions for transactions. The company followed a policy of limiting coal extraction in order to obtain monopoly profits.

The establishment of large metallurgical enterprises with their own raw material bases and the growing competitive struggle within the monopoly just before World War I weakened Produgol’. In 1913–14 the number of its contracting parties dropped to 19, and their share of Donets coal extraction fell to 54 percent. The company was dissolved on Dec. 31, 1915.