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Tselina or virgin lands ( Russian: целина́, lit. 'whole lands'; Ukrainian: цілина́, romanized: tsilina) is an umbrella term for underdeveloped, scarcely populated, high-fertility lands often covered with the chernozem soil. [1] The lands were mostly located in the steppes of the Volga region, Northern Kazakhstan and Southern Siberia. [2]
The term became widely used in the late 1950s and early 1960s in the Soviet Union during the Virgin Lands campaign ( Russian: Освое́ние целины́, romanized: Osvoyeniye tseliny, lit. 'reclamation of tselina') - a state development and resettlement campaign to turn the lands into a major agriculture producing region.[ citation needed]