BACK TO THE LAND

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22628, 20 July 1935, Page 25

BACK TO THE LAND

A GERMAN MOVEMENT AGRICULTURAL PLANNING TOWARDS HER GOAL Farmers, labour conscripts, and women workers on the land are engaged in a great national movement to increase Germany’s agricultural resources, as insurance against another food shortage such as she experienced during the war, writes Sir Percival Phillips in the Daily Telegraph. The Government’s plan for increasing productivity and making the country self-dejjenderit is as comprehensive as is its mobilisation of industry. If completely successful it will make Germany independent of foreign markets in all essential foodstuffs and raw materials. The first effects will be seen at the coming harvest, but it will take at least three years to achieve practical results on a largo scale. During the war the nation suffered chiefly from the lack of fats and proteins, and the first aim of the new campaign is to make good this deficiency. In recent years, according to statistics issued by a German Research Committee, the farmers have supplied less than 1 per cent, of unmixed vegetable fats and table oils required for domestic consumption, under 9 per cent, of total vegetable fats, and never above 69 per cent, of total fats. The production of margarine and lentils has been 10 to 19 per cent. Of such commodities as butter, lard and venison, which supply animal fats, the yield from home sources has been 80 per cent, of consumption, and of dairy products, fresh water fish and vegetables, 90 to 97 per cent. The annual harvest has produced nearly 100 per cent, of the requirements of rye, wheat, barley, oats and potatoes. THEIR CONCERN.- \

In concentrating on the greater production of fats and proteins the experts are thinking principally of butter, cheese, eggs, lard, tallow, oil seeds and whale oil. The two latter commodities are largely used in the manufacture of margarine and table oils. Oil seeds are compressed into vegetable' oils, and arc also employed for protein-containing fodder, which in increases the production of milk, cheese, butter and beef.

Germany's production of certain essential agricultural raw materials has also been short of domestic requirements. It has been less than 1 per cent, of hemp, jute, hard fibres, cotton, silk, rubber, resinous products and shellac, _ only 1 to 4 per cent, of material for oil seeds) oil cake and vegetable oils, 5 to 9 per cent, of wool, 10 to 19 per cent, of flax and tonning materials, 20 to 29 per cent, of tobacco, 50 to 59 per cent, of hides and skins. ' The national plan for making good this shortage calls for more intensive cultivation, > improved fertilisation, greater variety of products, the proper selection of crops, planned timber cutting and improvement of the land now under cultivation as well as the reclamation of waste areas judged suitable for growing crops. There are about 109,000,000 acres of land, including arable land, pastures and forests, now under cultivation. It is estimated that another 10,600,000 acres at present not utilised can he made productive.

THE ANNUAL YIELD. Planless over-production is to be avoided by rebalancing the annual crop yield. The area now undjjr rye will be reduced by 601,000 acres', a decrease iof 6 per ccut.; the potato acreage will bo reduced by 123,000 acres, leaving 247,000 acres under cultivation, and the production of barley will be increased by 370,000 acres. Farmers will be trained to concentrate on intensive cultivation and the better breeding of livestock, especially sheep. Domestic wool production is to bo increased from 9 per cent, to 27 per cent, of consumption by tripling the number of sheep, which is at present about 3,300,000. The shortage of home-grown wool will be made up as far as possible by the use of wool substitute fibres, but the future of this new industry is still uncertain. Dr Walter Frenzel, director of the Professional Textile School of Chemnitz, in a lecture on the new textile economy, delivered recently, estimated that the cost of these fibres under present conditions is about 50 per cent, higher than wool. The Imperial Economic Committee, which has investigated the use of wool substitutes, is of the opinion that so long ns Germany can continue to find the foreign exchange for raw material purchases abroad, little will be heard of them. Germany cannot hope to triple her production of home-grown wool in less than 10 years. HARVEST PLANNING.

There is more likelihood of vegetable fibre substitutes becoming a satisfactory and less expensive material to replace imported raw materials. There is a better prospect of , increased supplies of other commodities. Farmers will base their harvest planning on improved fertilisation, the use of higher grade seeds, the proper selection of crops as indicated by the State, r d more intelligent care in growing them. This intensive effort is expected to increase the average yield per acre by 10 per cent,, having regard to production in past years.

Subsidies are to be granted to the farmer to grow stocks for vegetable oils and seed cake. The shortage in this respect is acute, owing to foreign exchange difficulties. Oil-crushing firms arc now utilising animal fats to eke out their supplies from abroad. The largest, of these firms, Messrs Brankmann and Margall, of Harburg, near Hamburg, are slaughtering from 3000 to 4000 pigs daily, which is good business for pig-breeders, but very expensive.

Oil cake is the favourite food of German cattle, because it is “doctored"’ with the residue from beet-sugar factories, and when so sweetened is made palatable. Cows in Great Britain wilt not touch oil cake in its natural state. OIL FROM WHALES. The formation of a German whaling industry is another phase of the foodsupply campaign. Hitherto Germany has purchased whale oil from Norway. The principal oil-crushing firms have been merged into a syndicate which will operate a whaling fleet out of Warnemunde, the Baltic port.

The scheme has been condemned as uneconomic and not worth the outlay. Moreover, if successful, it will deprive Germany of another export market, as Norway has no other export commodity, and instead of buying German goods in exchange, as in the past, she will be compelled to look elsewhere. Whale oil is an attractive ingredient for making margarine, as it will absorb a proportion of its weight in water, which costs nothing, enabling 1001 b of oil to produce 1141 b of margarine. Critics of the food-supply scheme are doubt'ful of its success. The official promoters admit that even when in full momentum it will still be necessary to import certain agricultural products, but they maintain that these will be confined mainly to coffee, tobacco, and cocoa. =

They hold out the hgpc to foreign markets that when Germany has been rendered self-supporting in essential

foodstuffs there will still be “ ample possibilities ” for the sale of her industrial products in exchange for commodities which she still Jacks. The mobilisation of the land affects all classes of the population. The call to service in the labour corps for improving the farms and preparing new ones has not been responded to with alacity. Many young men under 25 have been forced to resign lucrative positions since they are in the category of “ superfluous ” workers and are keeping older men from obtaining employment. Service is supposed to be voluntary, but conscripts who ignore the invitation to join up for work on the 1 land are warned that they will be blacklisted on arriving at the age when they can seek re-engagementa in civil life. SENT BACK. Mobilisation has been more rapid than the absorption of labour in the new units. Many youths after being called up have been sent back to their employment to await a second summons. One estimate given me placed the number in excess of present requirements at 40,000. The confusion in this branch of the new bureaucracy has reacted in business life, for firms are ‘ suffering from the dislocation of their routine because of the enforced reorganisation of their staffs. One business man with whom I talked was compelled to release a competent secretary, who after his place had been filled returned with an order from the Labour Bureau that he was to be re-employed until room could be made for him in a labour camp. This was done, and a few days later his employer was notified that he was again to be discharged, as a place had been found in another corps. The baek-to-the-land movement is being further encouraged by sending older unemployed men who have relatives on farms to rejoin them and assist in agricultural work. They may do no more than feed the live stock, but even this task is sufficient for their names to be taken’from the unemployed roster.

In Berlin the new adventure in agriculture is explained as an economic measure imposed on Germany by financial stringency as the only alternative to buying supplies at exorbitant prices in foreign markets. But ask a farmer why he has been told to grow more foodstuffs and be quick about it, and he will reply that it is because Germany does not want to be faced with famine if she has to fight again.