KECKXT PROVISION'S AS TO ACKICri.TrRAI, CKKDIT 43 



zionalc di ('ycdifo per la Coopcrazioni (National Institute of Credit for Co- 

 operation), the savings-banks, X\\^ Monti di pieta and the institutions of ordi- 

 nary and co-operative credit were authorized, indej)endently of any pro- 

 vision of laws, regulations or by-laws, to grant loans to the agricultural 

 Ijodies in Latium for the acquisition of land, the payment of capital and 

 dues, for emancipations and, in general, for anything necessary to the im- 

 provement of land or the transformation of agriculture in properties held 

 collectively. To secure such loans the agricultural bodies of Latium will 

 allow the lending institutions to be regularly represented on the collector- 

 ship of the societies' revenue : and when the revenue collected in a year does 

 not reach the whole amount of the payments due in that year to the lending 

 institutions the State will advance the difference. 



The Istifiito nazionale di credito per la coopcrazione is further authorized 

 to give credit to the aforesaid agricultural bodies in order to provide them 

 with necessary means for the pursuance of ordinary cultivation and the 

 farming of their lands (acquisition of live and other stock anfl seeds, pa}-meut 

 of wages and of expenses of harvest, etc.). 



Loans for the acquisition of lands, emancipation from dues and, in 

 general, the improvement of lands, can be for a maximum term of fifty years, 

 the debtor having the option of extinguishing them earlier. The rate of 

 interest may not exceed 5^2 P^^ cent, and the State will contribute to its 

 j-jayment up to i \(, per cent. 



To conclude : as the ex-Minister of Agriculture, Signor Raineri, re- 

 marked in a recent s])eech at Salerno on the governement's agricultural po- 

 licy, a new s)'stem of agricultural credit has gradually taken form in the 

 recent exceptional provisions. The credit affected used to be essentially 

 personal. The new measures have transformed it into a credit predomi- 

 nantly based on real estate. The decree of 10 INIay 1917 for the cultiva- 

 tion of food stuffs enlarged the basis of the privilege which the law had creat- 

 ed, so that it now covers not only the crop which the loans contribute to 

 produce, but also all crops of the land indiscriminately, including hanging 

 fruit and stored provisions. Thus the rules were modified and land cre- 

 dit was created. The subsidizing of the institutions of agricultural credit 

 with important resources of the Treasury was then undertaken, in order that 

 they might grant loans as liberally as possible. All these measures were 

 inspired by the fundamental desire to increase production and to satisfy 

 the new needs of agriculture. 



