THE WORK OF THE AGRICULTURAI, CREDIT INSTITUTIONS 75 



of the deposit at the rate fixed for loans in money, the interest on which 

 may in no case exceed 4 %. The maximum term for loans will be a year, 

 and they will be renewable for another year. lyoans can only be granted 

 to farmers and for purposes of agriculture, on personal security. When 

 there are many applications, the loans must be in preference granted to 

 small farmers paying the smallest tax for agriculture or livestock improve- 

 ment. For the purposes of the inventory of the assets, the realisation 

 of credits and the transformation of the existing positos so as to obtain 

 for them as rapidly as possible the means of continuing and accomplishing 

 their mission, the law provided that the Minister of Agriculture should 

 appoint a Royal Delegate entrusted with its execution, and furnished 

 with extensive powers (i). 



For the complete application of the law in view of the deplorable 

 condition of the positos, the Royal Delegation had necessarily in the 

 beginning two objects to attain: liquidation of the positos without excit- 

 ing ill feeUng and their modernisation as far as possible. 



Consequently, it began by " Metalizacion " , that is to say, by realising 

 the greater part of the assets of these estabHshments and all the credit that 

 could be collected. 



With a healthy energy, a firmness not however excessive — it could 

 not, in fact, be forgotten that the Positos were founded for the assistance 

 of the peasants and not to ruin them — in five years the delegation was 

 able to reconstitute a capital of 50,000,000 pesetas (not including the 

 amounts already in cash belonging to 3,460 positos) it also founded 80 

 other positos with a capital of 626,919 pesetas, and subsidised others to 

 the amount of 266,141 pesetas: 



Between 1906 and 1912 the number of positos increased as follows: 



1906 3410 



1909 • ■ 3.501 



1910 3,520 



1911 3.529 



1912 3.540 



Positos are not found in every part of the country; we may say that 

 their work is only regular and useful in the two Castilles, Iveon, Aragon, 

 la Mancha and Extramadura. There are none in Galicia and the Basque 

 Provinces, which are essentially districts of Uvestock improvement, where 

 there is hardly any grain cultivated, and consequently P6sitos could 

 be of no use there, before the realisation of their assets. 



In Catalonia and the east of Spain there are few P6sitos and those 

 that exist are of httle use to the farmers, on the one hand, on account of 



(i) This delegate was appointed for 5 years, but at the end of the term he was con- 

 firmed in his office until the reorganisation of the p6sitos sould be completed, and now the 

 office has been eight years in existence. 



