Land Tenure in Denmark.

Timaru Herald, Volume LXXXI, Issue 12480, 17 September 1904, Page 3 (Supplement)

Land Tenure in Denmark.

A veiy interesting section of the report of the deputation sent by the' Department of Agriculture of Great Britain to Denmark, is thai) which deals with the relation between the land tenure of the country and co-operation, working, conjointly with it on the one hand, and agricultural prosperity on the other. The present wealthy state of Denmark, says the report, is attributable, as far as can be observed, to three causes —First, the establishment of a system of education through the medium of what are called popular high schools ; secondly, peasant proprietorship ; thirdly, almost universal cooperation. It'is with the second of these three headings that- this section of the report is immediately concerned. Before 1792 the land in Denmark was principally held by a few large proprietors, and since that time it: has be.en gradually passing into the hands of the tenants, and is now held chiefly, by peasants themselves as proprietors. o As" above stated, the system of transfer from the large landowners to the peasants was gradual up to about the year 1851. when a great stimulus was given _to the desire for ownership by the establishment, of companies in Denmark, who provided capital to the would-be proprietors on mortgages of the acquired holdings. These mortgages were repayable with interest by annual instalments for fifty years as a minimum, so that at the present time those who availed themselves of these financial socieiies, on then- minimum number of years' purchase, are now absolute holders. Most of the purchasing occupiers, however, took longer periods, some even up to one hundred years, for repayment of the capital. As.before stated, this system of purchase has become so general that at present tlie small percentage of tenants are those who are holding their laud on a. very old custom which prevails on certain estates. The systems of land tenure at present are practically four in number

(1) Estate owiers who have retained their demesnes and home farms, and, in some cases, a few outlying farms. The home farms under this class of owner are m no way neglected as compared with the farms of the peasant proprietor; the estate owner is as alive to the importance of cultivating his land in the best possible manner, in order to bring him in as great a return proportionately, as his neighbour, the peasant proprietor; in fact, he; is very often looked ~p to as an example in the cultivation and management of his farm, and one whose methods the smaller people endeavour as far as possible to imitate. Again, tlie lord of the' manor, as you may so describe him, has, by taking his p'ace and position among the people on a'footing of democratic equality, becomes in many instances, their natural'leader in local affairswhereas, under the old system of landlord and tenant,' there were constant sources of friction, and his influence and popularity might be placed in the same, category as that of the land-owning and peasant classes in Ireland at the present day. This was most strikingly brought home by a visit made to the owner of a very large tract of country, the great proportion of which had been sold to the tenants; but be still retained a few farms, which were Jet on a system to be described later. The great friendliness and freemasonry, if it may" be so expressed, between the farmers who were peasant proprietors and the present owner nf the estate, was most remarkable, and to further show how he was respected he had been placed, by election, on every representative body in that part of Denmark, and gave great impetus to material progress, which is fully borne out by the statistics of the countryand which, is also manifested in connection with every department of Danish commerce and industry. Before concluding this paragraph, let it be again repeated that the estate owner, with his demesne and home farm, is equally a farmer, and "gives every attention possible to the'high cultivation and maintenance of his lands as does the smallest peasant proprietor in Denmark.

(2) The next system of land tenure is an old custom which is prevalent in certain parts of Scotland. This system is called the " Faeste," the best method of ib ing which would be to put forwn r d at example:—A landlord has a farm to let; this farm, from time immemorial, has had a fixed value, which is well known to everybody ; but this va'ue is ,of a fictitious nature, being only a figure fixed for tlir purpose of letting, never, perhaps, exceeding, half the sealing value of the land. Wf r presume, in this case, the figute to be £4OOO. The farmer who takes this will br required to pay t'mvn £ISOO in cash or assuming possession, and, besides this srm he will pay an annual rent of about £160.' or about 4 per cent, on the nominal sum of £4OOO. He cannot be turned out of thif farm during his own life, or the life of hi> wife. The system takes rather the fnnr of a speculation, in that should the ma) die in any year before he has complete' 15 years' possession the owner refunds to the widow £IOO for every year short othe 15 years; so that, should the tenant die after ten years' occupation, his widow, if he has one, will receive £5-0 and she shall still continue to be the ten ant for the rest of her life, but has to the annual sum originally stipulated. Shonlf the farmer, however, not have a wife, tb' money which should go, in the case o' his death before 15 years, to the .widow could not- be claimed from the Jandowrer and the farmer's son, if he had one, wou'« ; have to enter upon the farm if he wishe to do so, in exactly the same manner n his father did before him, and, in any case upon the death of the widow, the son if he wished to do so, could only succee 1 to the farm' on precisely the same condi tions. Analysing this, system, therefore it would appear that the terms of the ten ancv become very much the nature of r gamble in life insurance. Of course, to i' young farmer the terms are exceeding srood, seeing that- the nominal sum on. whic' the rent and premium are payable is wel under the selling value. (3) The ordinary tenancy, as is knowin other parts of Denmark, is very simiV to the terms of leasehold to farmers in Eng land. It is arranged between tenant am' landlord by mutual agreement; —but~Tre queftt-ly ~ includes the taking over of- liv otnnV 'mil I'mploTtiPTitn -flm-property of -the landlord'. These are taken at a valuation and any additions or alterations to eitheof these stocks during the tenancy have to lie paid for qji the' conclusion of- the term by the landlord or tenant, as the ens' might be, at a valuation. (4) Peasant proprietorship. This form o land tenure is by far the greatest in the country, as indicated by the above figure Over. 110 years ago agitation was rife i: the country for peasant proprietorship, and indeed, it may be said that at that perior" the position of the Danish tenant was almost analogous to that of the serfs ir Russia at a more recent date: Depmark as a country, at the time was not pro gressing in commercial or industrial pros perity; in fact, at that period the comparisons between Denmark and Ireland of less than half a century ago were very analogous, emigration taking place on a very large scale, and general trouble am" die-content prevailing throughout the land. While on the subject of emigration, to show the value of co-operation in Denmark foretaining the people at home—and to nt ofhev cause but co-operation can this be attributed—it is a fact that the total emi gration for the four years 1891-1895 wa* ovtr 61,000, or over 1-5,000 per annum: whereas the figures for the year 1899, alone are only 5700, or little over one-third Tn the year 1851 the desire for ownershijof the land was so intense that it was i

question whether State funds or guarantee of credit should not Tie made available The solution, however, was brought about by the starting of a number of private com panies or associations, known in ■ Franc as the Credit Foncier System. Their rules, however, had to receive the approval o' the Danish Government, so that in this wav the societies were, to a very consid erable extent, State controlled. The com panies thus formed took mortgages up to 50 per' cent.,- and in a few cases 60 pecent., of the purchase price, and the re payment of these mortgages extended fron periods of 50 to 100 years. The establish inent of these means of obtaining money or gopd terms gave the peasants an iinpetu to work and save money to enab'e their to borrow 50 per cent, or 60 per cent, of the purchase price of the property, tr which .they added their own hoardings, saved by industry with a view to purchase. The interest and repayment of thes< loans are still a very heavy drag on the "farmers ; but,- at the same time, they arc cheerfully borne for the following reasons : —The farmer feels, if he is a young man. that he will one day benefit by liavinp "no further instalments or .interest, to .pay and practically the whole of the profit from his farming will be for liis own use: secondly, the load ifi carried lightly, seeing that he takes a more than mtellicen' interest in his farm, and so works the land and attends to his stock that they produce more profit, thus giving him about thf same amount more in profit for his own uff as he would have to pay in repayment of loan interest and taxes. Again, if lie bar a son, he feels happy in the reflection t-ha' he has paid off so many instalments ; that wlwfh bis sort succeeds he will in all probability come into the full enjoyment of absolute ownership. In the case of one small farm out of many which were visiter, the proprietor had seven years' more instalments to pnv, and in his case he liac six acres, for which, in interest and repayment. he had to pay 200 kroner, oi £ll 3s annually, of which 60 kroner, or £3 7s 6d, were'rates and taxes, local and State, the remainder being instalments, and interest on the original mortgage. Even with this heavy rent, so to speak, the farmer was : able to so-work his land as i to bring. him in enough to keep himself in comfort and ease without extravagance. Farms f of varying sizes up to 600 acres were visited; but it was "undoubtedly obvi- i ous that the smaller farmer, who held only the average number of acres, say about 23 or 24, was able to give more attention to details than the larger, besides providing almost the whole of the labour in his own family; whereas the larger farmer has to pay a staff of men, who, consequently, cannot have the same interest in attaining perfection as has the master. The peasants, as well as the former landlords, were practically unanimous in agreeing that, under the present conditions of education and land tenure, coupled with co-operation, the country had made great strides to prosperity. Also, co-operation would not have had -such'.'great effects, comparatively speaking, upon the country, without peasant proprietorship. The reason for this js obvious, seeing that farmer's who hold their land for uncertain terms and periods were half-hearted in any attempts at .successful co-operation ; whereas at present the peasant proprietor leaves no stone unturned to become part owner of bis creamery, stallion. bull, boar, or bacon factory." In the little villages no'signs of dirty, unkempt farms or houses were visible—everything was tidy and neat, and in ope small village

populated almost entirely by small peasant proprietors and their families, and certainly having no more than 250 head of population, their spirit of co-operation and zeal in search of knowledge was such that they had established a small hall, in which lectures on Danish history, and other interesting subjects, were given every Sunday afternoon, and on week days the hall was utilised in the evening by the young men as a gymnasium. This is rather a digression from peasant proprietorship, but it adds a proof of how far peasant proprietorship has assisted to bring comfort and orderly ways and manners to an entirely rustic population. Peasant proprietorship has marched side by side with another more important factor of Danish prosperity, which is the system of education among the people, and the outcome of this education, cqupled with peasant proprietorship, has been co-operation.—" Irish Homestead." 1 .