Belarus

Belarus (, earlier ) is a series of four-wheeled tractors produced since 1950 at Minsk Tractor Works, MTZ in Minsk, Belarus. These tractors are very well known throughout the Commonwealth of Independent States and are exported to more than 100 countries worldwide, including the United States and Canada. History At the end of World War II, agricultural infrastructure in the Soviet Union was in a poor state, production of agricultural machinery having been nonexistent during the later years of the War. Those tractors and machinery still working on the large collective farms were worn from heavy use and also dated, with most having been produced in the early 1930s or earlier. At best, these tractors were unreliable and were poorly maintained. The communist state ordered new tractors to be made at several locations within the USSR. The main assembly plant for MTZ was in Minsk, with smaller tractors being produced in other locations and other factories producing high-horsepower articulated and tracked tractors. All these tractors were exported under the name "Belarus", but were of a different design to each other. Within the Eastern Bloc the tractors had no paint scheme: they were simply painted the same colour all over, with red, green and blue being the most common. In the late 1980s Belarus tractors gained a paint livery of cream/white, cream wheels, with a red chassis; this remained until the late 1990s, when it changed to red with a black chassis and cream wheels (later silver). A green alternative to the red was available for some markets during the 2000s (decade). Blue with a black chassis is currently the livery for the more basictwo-wheel-drive cab-less models.