A FARMER'S QUESTION.

Waikato Times, Volume XVI, Issue 1364, 29 March 1881, Page 3

A FARMER'S QUESTION.

The following review from the Melbourne Leader of a paper read at a Farmer's Club at Ballarat will be of some importance to - the farmers : — "Oh a well conducted?farm the minor and varied products amount in the aggregate to a substantial sum at the end of the year. Boot-growing, particularly the cultivatiqn of, sugar-beet,' does not receive the attention it deserved from our iarmerß,i armerB, and were they to direct their combined influence ,in the proper direction,, distillation fronv locally, grown beet might soon be largely, .carried on in' the colony. . The local, market for beet sugar is practically unlimited. Take the item of malt also and we find that although large areas of Victoria are adapted for the production of the best qualities of malting "barley, yet the producers are compelled to accept a low price for their grain. '' Upon every bushel of barley 3s 6d is made by the malster, and this profit we have shown on previous occasions might be secured by the farmers themselves, if they chose to iorm co-operative malting barns in their districts. Then as to the important question of brewing from malt ■ instead of sugar, what^ it may be. asked, are the farmers about, that they do not ufciliise their Unions so as to break up the great monoply which' prejudices their interests in this connection? Mr Stevenson, in his lecture, asserts* that " the breweU* makes 12s 6d out of "what barley the farmer s el] 8 him for 2s. v It is thus easily perceived that sugar in a very much greater degree than malt is used by our brewers and distillers. The farmers by legitimately using their combined influence, have it in their power to prohibit the use of sugar in brewing, and compelling the use of malt. The use.of sugar in brewing is tabooed in England, and why should it be 'permitted here? The use, of malt !, would eusure to the public a, non-dele-teriouS article of- consumption, compare! with what is supplied at present and would remedy the low prices for barley which the present over supply has caused.