SCIENTIFIC PROGRESS IN WEST INDIES 393 



office and ;^i 2,400 as grants-in-aid of the maintenance of botanic 

 and experiment stations and on agricultural education in the 

 several Colonies. 



In 1906 the grants to Jamaica to provide the services of 

 an agricultural lecturer, to British Guiana for carrying on 

 scientific experiments to improve the sugar industry, and to 

 Trinidad (for Tobago) for maintaining a botanic and experiment 

 station were withdrawn. Since 1908 the grants to the other 

 Colonies have been gradually reduced and the balance in each 

 case has been provided by contributions from colonial funds. 

 It is in contemplation that in 191 3, or possibly earlier, all con- 

 tributions from Imperial funds for the maintenance of the local 

 agricultural departments will entirely cease. 



The duties entrusted to the Department include the general 

 improvement of the sugar industry, and the encouragement 

 of a system of subsidiary industries in localities where the 

 conditions are more favourable for the production of such crops 

 as cacao, coffee, bananas, limes, cotton, rubber, coco-nuts, sisal 

 hemp, rice, nutmegs and pineapples. Attention has also been 

 devoted to the improvement of the breed and condition of cattle, 

 horses and small stock, and to the extension of bee-keeping. 



As the mass of the people in the West Indian Colonies must 

 continue to be dependent on the products of the soil, a prominent 

 position has been given to teaching the principles of elementary 

 science and agriculture in the primary and secondary schools. 

 The Department has devoted special attention to the scientific 

 investigation of questions affecting the sugar industry. The 

 investigations have included the raising of new seedling varieties 

 of sugar-canes capable of yielding a larger return per acre and of 

 withstanding disease ; the testing the relative values of manures, 

 and of different methods of tillage ; and the introduction of 

 modern agricultural implements. 



The Department has carried on experiments in manuring 

 cacao plantations and in dealing with fungoid and insect pests 

 affecting cacao. 



The Commissioners conclude as follows : 



" The great extension in recent years of the cultivation of 

 cotton in the West Indies is very largely due to the efforts of 

 the Department, who took especial pains to supply at cost price 

 large quantities of seed of the best variety of Sea-island cotton. 

 Three fully-equipped cotton-ginning factories were erected and 



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