AGRICULTURE IN BRITAIN

Taranaki Daily News, 4 August 1930, Page 9

AGRICULTURE IN BRITAIN

POLICY OF GOVERNMENT PROVISION OF EMPLOYMENT ASSISTANCE TO FARMERS ■British Wireless. Rugby, Aug. J. The Government’s agricultural policy was stated in the House of Commons by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. P. Snowden, who said that the Government had given anxious consideration to the problem, with special regard 10 the desirability of increasing employment on the land with good standards of living.

Recognising that" this could only be. secured, through prosperity in that industry a proposal will be submitted for making land more freely available for small cultivators and affording them adequate- security of tenure. A scheme will be undertaken whereby a contribution may be made to the mitigation of unemployment by the creation of a special class of allotments and of market, garden and poultry holdings up to five acres for suitable unemployed workers.

An agricultural land utilisation corporation will be established to conduct, on the one hand, large-scale farming managed on business principles with the particular object of affording, to agriculturists a practical training in business management and, on the other hand, additional demonstration farms of various types in different parts of the country "designed to secure the quicker and more general adoption of every agricultural improvement, ■■■■ . It is pointed out that the question of the condition of cereal'farmers in different parts of the Empire will be discussed at tho forthcoming Imperial Conference, with special reference to bulk purchases, import boards and the stabilisation of prices. As soon as the decisions of the Imperial Conference are known the Government will undertake whatever practicable steps can be devised to put cereal-growing in Britain on an economic basis.

An agricultural marketing Bill is foreshadowed, which contemplates the organisation of two distinct types:, (1) of the well-known pool type; (2) of the regulatory type, concerned more with the craft of marketing than with physical control and handling of the product, and which, after, the manner of a board of directors, would formulate a coherent marketing policy for home products and carry it into effect. Financial assistance by way of both long and short term loans will be available for these commodity marketing boards. Other features of the proposed policy cover the development of agricultural education and research and conditions and the housing of the agricultural labourer.