A FORTNIGHTLY REVIEW 



OF THE 



IMPERIAL DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE FOR THE WEST INDIES. 



Vol. XVII. No. 411. 



BARBADOS, JANUARY 26, 1918. 



Pkice Id. 



ducers' Organization, which was reported in The Tivies,^ ^^ 

 November !•, 1917, uttered a warning to the nation as- ' 



Peace and Food Scarcity. 



^<!>-^r^^C^3l 



V^rj^HE title of this article may seem strange 

 P^i idTi.a.nd strike a jarring note, for the expression 

 ^^4=^% peace and plenty has a more familiar ring, 

 and most people appear to feel that food scircity will 

 somehow luitomatically cease with the war, and that 

 peace and plenty will be synonymou.s terms. Stich an 

 idea how/ver is demonstrably wrong. If peace were 

 proclaii>ied to-morrow, the scarcity now existing in 

 food !Aipplies must continue not only for this year, but 

 probably for some time afterwards, because of the world- 

 wid\: conditions which the war has brought about, and 

 whic}< can only be ameliorated by degrees. 



Mr. Prothero, President of the British Board of 

 Agrici.;lture, in a speech to the British Empire Pro- 



to the seriousness of the food outlook even if peace 

 were soon made. This speech is so apposite to notions 

 apparently widespread in these West Indian islands, 

 that the reproduction of parts of it in this Journal need 

 no apolog}'. Mr. Prothero said that some of them^ 

 perhaps, were inclined to thmk that the difficulty of the 

 f-ituation would be over, when they heard the joy bells 

 ringing 'peace and plenty. But the food situation would 

 not be rendered less difficult by the proclamation of 

 peace; on the contrary, the difficulty might even be in- 

 creased by it. It was quite true that sources of food 

 supply which had been closed to us would be reopened. 

 On the other hand, it was almost certain that the 

 demand for the world's exportable surplus would be 

 very largely increased. A danger not unforeseen had 

 been slowly approaching, and unless it was arrested ib 

 would rapidly develop. The productive power of the 

 Eoil of Europe was failing. It was not merely thafc 

 large areas under cultivation were now devastated 

 wastes; it was that regions remote from military 

 operations were losing their fertility for want of labour 

 and fertilizers. 



After referring to the proveib about peace and 

 plent}- much in the terms alluded to above, the 

 speaker went on to say that peace would not bring 

 plenty to us unless we were able at once to return in 

 three important particulars to pre-war conditions. We 

 must have the food for sale on the foreign market: we 

 must have the means with which to buy it: and we 

 must have the means by which to carry it home. 



The three conditions leferred to by Mr. Prothero 

 as applying to Great Britain equally apply to theg 



^T A file, 



**^xuen 



