Lugger building in the state shipyard

• Helmut Reinl
• around 1952
• oil on hard fibre
• width: 100 cm

As part of the reparations to the Soviet Union the state shipyard in Stralsund supplied around 150 luggers up to the end of 1953. These ships were mainly used for catching fish in the Baltic Sea. Although the actual manufacturing costs per ship amounted to 1.2 million Marks, only 400,000 Marks per ship were charged to the reparation account.

The GDR was one of the world’s largest shipbuilding nations. What is widely unknown is that most East German shipyards “owed” their foundation and upsurge to the excessive Soviet reparation demands after the end of the Second World War.

The starting position for economic recovery in the Soviet occupation zone quickly became different from the situation in the remaining zones. Even though the damage to industry was lower than is often thought, the main problems were caused by the barely effective transport network. The recovery difficulties also lay in the fact that the occupying power claimed a significant part of the available labour force, the workers‘ performance decreased due to the permanent provisions crisis and a large proportion of skilled workers were employed by foreign businesses.