World Census of Farms to be Taken in 1930

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 508, 10 November 1928, Page 16

World Census of Farms to be Taken in 1930

Institute at Rome Is Gathering Data

“A BETTER GUIDE’

Tlie first world census of any kind is to be made of agriculture in 1930, writes tlie “New York Times.” Final arrangements for it are to be made by tbe Nineteenth General Assembly of the International Institute of Agriculture, which meets at Rome, Italy, on October 10. Leon M. Estabrook, a United States Department of Agriculture statistician, is the director of the census-taking enterprise. The census is expected to mark the beginning of the development of facilities and practices whereby accurate and complete information on agriculture throughout the world will be available currenly to the extent that such information is now available in several countries. The full worth of much agricultural data now gathered regularly is not realised for the reason that only a portion of the facts bearing on equations like supply and demand are covered. Students of the subject say that prices of the principal agricultural products are being shaped more and more by world conditions. The farm census also may prove to be a first step toward other all-world surveys, such as surveys of populationfor the world as a whole a matter of estimates —and manufactures. Plans for the all-world farm census were originated by the International Institute of Agriculture, which was founded by M. Lubin, an American about 20 years ago, and is now maintained co-operatively by the Governments of the chief farming countries. Funds for preliminary arrangements for the census were supplied by the International Education Board, an establishment of the Rockefeller Foundation. The work has been under the supervision of an international committee, of which Rudolph Benini, of Italy, has been chairman, and R. J. Thompson, of England, secretary. Leon M. Estabrook has been the active director since the preliminary work was started in 1925. He has personally procured pledges of cooperation from Governments speaking for more than 90 per cent, of the world’s agriculture and nearly as large a proportion of world population. He has yet to visit several Latin-Amerlcan and mid-Asian countries. While in the United States recently, on his way to Rome, Mr.

Estabrook said it was certain that promised co-operation would cover practically all of the world’s agriculture. Unknown Quantities “Of the countries listed by the institute, only 60 have ever taken an agricultural census,” said Mr. Estabrook. “Practically all of the others figure in the international phases of agricultural problems. Most of them produce in some measure for export and all of them import farm products. “We can only estimate as to these countries and estimates are uncertain, for the data on which to base them is incomplete. * Crop forecasting in the United States would be scarcely more than mere guessing if we did not have census data, now collected in detail every five years, as bases for projecting reports. “The all-world census of 1930 will cover crops and farming conditions as of 1929 in the Northern Hemisphere, and as of the last half of 1929 and the first half of 1930 in the Southern Hemisphere. Schedules and definitions will he uniform. These already are comprehended in this country’s census taking; hence the facts needed for all-world computations will be drawn from the regular reports, which include much more in this country. “Inasmuch as nothing of the kind ever has been done in many lands, the scope of the all-world census will be limited to prime essentials. Tentative schedules include the taking of the names of all operators of farms of two and a-half acres and larger size, and classifications as to owners, tenants and managers. The area of all farm units will be designated, together with the distribution as to use for cultivation, pasture, woodland and so on. “Actual plantings and yields of principal crops, such as grain, root and forage products, industrial crops of the sugar-yielding kind, fibre crops like cotton and flax, the oil seed products, vegetables and fruits that are grown generally or widely and vineyard and orchard products, will be recorded. Even Domestic Animals “Principal domestic animals, Including even those peculiar to certain areas, like camels, elephants and ostriches, will be enumerated, some of them as to sex and age. “Farm work will be surveyed in rather full detail, both as to employment of members of farmers’ families and of hired workers, with rates of pay and practices as to housing and feeding. The character and use of 1 fertilisers will be recorded and prin- I clpal articles of farm machinery found on farms will be enumerated. : Thus the findings will be of great : help to many manufacturers ” There are many evidences of an unusual change under way in agricul- : tural production and consumption. The food habits of many peoples have changed much in recent years.

For example, per capita consumption of cereals and meats has been tend ing downward in this country upward in Middle Europe. At th same time Middle European farming is evidently tending away f ro ls production of staples and app»7 ently concentrating more and more on products that are less dependent than say, the bread grains on the cultiy» tion of big areas. Such tendencie. may be having an effect on interna tional trade in many farm products As a Beginning While they expect it to be the bU gest of all moves yet made in the direction of developing and co-ordin ating facilities for keeping up with agriculture, promoters of the census say that it may be more important as a start than as an actual achievement. They are not sure how fujlv many of the Governments that have pledged co-operation will or can produce full findings. For example, j t is hardly possible that the census taking will be anything like complete in China, one of the foremost farming countries, and statistically probably the least known of aIL Cooperation by British and native rulers is expected to yield good re suits for India, however. In some countries where farmers long have been accustomed to censustaking there is among the peasants much suspicion of census-takers Russia is an example. But for mamyears now farm census findings in this and several other countries'have been regarded as about as accurate as they could be made. Those findings are the chief bases of practically all studies of and reports on farming subjects.