BRITISH FARMERS

Waikato Times, Volume 123, Issue 20693, 31 December 1938, Page 23 (Supplement)

BRITISH FARMERS

UNHAPPY POSITION The Home farmer’s lot is not altogether a happy one and the following extract from a British exchange is interesting in that it gives an indication of how things are at the moment with Scottish farmers. “While armaments are being carried out those engaged in agriculture have not got any official lead from the Government as to what they are expected to do in the matter of food production and expansion. It looks as if storage of food is regarded of more importance by the Government than land fertility and home production. It is foreign countries and our own Dominions that are getting most encouragement in our preparations of defence. “Huge quantities of foodstuffs are being imported month after month. Arable land at Home is going out of cultivation, the drift from rural areas continues, and the general outlook for the industry is worse than it was a year ago. With the amalgamation of the Farmers’ Union and the Chamber of Agriculture, it is not likely that Scottish farmers will listen to smokeless talk much longer. Their tempers and their pockets have become too much stretched.” “Mr Elliot, the Secretary of State for Scotland, and who previously was Minister of Agriculture, is very effusive in his ‘’Foreword,’ which appears in the annual report of the National Farmers’ Union. He says that the production of each commodity has its own peculiar difficulties to contend with. And he also tells us that the Government’s objective has been, and continues, to be, to develop long term policies for each of the various branches of farming. Can the Secretary of State mention one of the Government's long term policies that has helped to put agriculture on the road to permanent recovery?” * Interesting Statistics

Statistics published in, the British exchange as follows ■ throw further light on the position of British agriculture:—“This year’s population of cattle, horses, sheep and poultry is considerably less than a year ago. The decrease in the tillage area has been 0000 acres. The number of workers on the land are fewer by 1000, compared with the previous year. These are serious weaknesses identified with a country's food production. “If we save £50,000,000 yearly by increasing our home food production and by importing less, does not our country benefit though as a result we lose £20,000,000 in our export trade of manufactured goods? The increasing burdens and demands made on farmers are ripping open the economic fabric of the industry, and playing profitably into the hands of foreign countries and our Dominions. Instead of subsidies the central executive of the Scottish Farmers' Union is convinced that a plan based on a levy on all imported meat and a regulated market would afford the best long term solution of the live-stock prorxem. 3 ’