DEVELOPMENT OF PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION IN THE FIELD OF AGRICULTURE IN RUSSIA (LATE XX – EARLY XXI CENTURY): TO THE HISTORIOGRAPHY OF THE PROBLEM

The issues of agrarian education evolvement in the USSR have been disclosed in sufficient detail in research, but the system of personnel training for agriculture in Russia in the post-Soviet period is covered very fragmentary. The article attempts to bring together individual research studies devoted to the development of vocational education in the agricultural sector of the Russian economy of the late XX – early XXI century. In our work, we focused on the views of researchers, government and public figures whose professional interests are related to agriculture. 
 
The historiography of the problem was divided into three groups: the first of them included publications of statesmen who develop legislative initiatives and implement public administration of the agro–industrial complex; the second group of publications consisted of analytical articles by scientists – specialists in the field of agriculture; the third group of studies is large analytical works prepared in the form of monographs, as well as doctoral and candidate dissertations. The main thematic blocks were: state policy in the field of higher agricultural education; the role of agricultural education in the development of the agro-industrial complex of Russia; the state and trends in the dynamics of agricultural education in Russia; the development of university science; the state agrarian policy in the context of reforming Russian society; secondary specialized agricultural education; personnel training for the agricultural sector of the economy of the Russian Federation regions. Most authors bring up issues about the need to increase state programs and measures to support agricultural universities, popularize and increase the prestige of agricultural education among young people.