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Richard Walther Darré (14 July 1895 in Buenos Aires, Argentina – 5 September 1953 in Munich, West Germany), born Ricardo Walther Óscar Darré, was a German agronomist, SS-Obergruppenführer, and leading Nazi Party racial theorist. Serving as Reich Farmers Leader (Reichsbauernführer) from 1933 to 1945 as well as Reich Minister for Food and Agriculture from 1933 to 1942, Darré strongly influenced German colonial and extermination policy in Eastern Europe by popularising the ideology of Blood and Soil. He eventually fell out of Heinrich Himmler's favour however in 1938 due to his own failures as well as differing policy visions (Darré wanted to focus primarily on strengthening German peasantry internally whereas Himmler prioritised eastern settlement), being effectively replaced as Food and Agriculture Minister by the more pragmatic Herbert Backe in May 1942.
During the Second World War, Darré oversaw the confiscation of farmland in occupied Poland and France for ethnic German management and eventual ownership, creating the East German Land Management Company. Afterwards in 1949, he was convicted of crimes against humanity, looting, and membership of criminal organisations during the Ministries Trial and sentenced to seven years in prison (of which he only served one). He died a free man in 1953.