LAND QUESTION AND PROPOSALS OF THE AGRICULTURAL COMMISSION 1 29 



alcoholism. Thus, instead of effort being made to instruct the working man 

 and raise his standard of hfe, profit is made out of his vices. 



The Umited requirements of the labourer and the attraction of a lit- 

 tle money on account explain why wages remain very low. A da}- lab- 

 ourer receives from 0.25 to 0.30 pesos a day (60 to 75 centimes). This low 

 rate, by reducing the cost of production, increases the rent of land and 

 facilitates the extensive agriculture of great capitalists. 



This is the reason why in ]\Iexico land of which the productive power 

 is less than that of land in Canada, the Argentine Republic and the United 

 States is yet more valuable (i) than where the labourers demand a larger 

 share of the 3neld. 



Besides, as Lauro Viadas observes in an official report, the low rate of 

 v.ages drives away those labourers whose education and requirements are 

 above the common level; they are compelled to seek higher pay in other 

 countries. Hence arises a curious phenomenon ; Mexican emigration, 

 increases every year while attempt is made to encourage foreign immigration 

 so that the riches of the country may be turned to account. 



In the opinion of competent ^Mexican writers, the solution of the 

 labour question is the education of the peasant; his standard of Hving must 

 be raised and his requirements increased in order to accustom him to regular 

 work to satisf}^ these. In this way alone will he become a true collaborator 

 with his employers. 



4. Rural Holdings and Colonisation. — In Mexico the system of large 

 estates prevails, the typical latifundium being constituted by means of 

 land conceded by the State with improvident UberaUty. The conditions of 

 iVIexican agriculture, the fertility of the soil, the small cost of labour and 

 the high price of agricultural produce give large profits to the farmer from 

 extensive cultivation or livestock improvement, Besides, many of these 

 latifundia lie uncultivated through neglect or want of capital, in the hands 

 of large families who would think it a disgrace to sell them. Thus neither 

 private persons nor capitahsts undertaking farming have any inducement 

 to divide land, on the contrary, there is a tendency to round off the estates 

 in the hope of a rise in the value of land. 



Till 1909 any one might purchase {denunciar) national land of which 

 the boundaries had generally been fixed by foreign companies in exchange 

 for one third of the area. The dcnuncia of such land consisted in an 

 offer of sale by the nation to the appHcant, who, hu\-ing paid the price, 

 incurred no other obligation. By this system any one who was an coiirant 

 as regarded the boundaries fixed could purchase immense tracts at an absurd- 

 ly low price (from 2 to 10 pesos per hectare). Nearly all the latifundia thus 

 formed are uncultivated, for they were bought merely as a speculation, 

 and they will remain so till they are bought at a high price by some 



(i) Land capable of irrigation and fit for corn fields is not sold under 300 pesos per 

 hectare, and not seldom land for the cultivation of cotton and sugar is sold at from 1,400 

 10 1,500 pesos per hectare. 



