Jl June, 1917. | Agricultural Produclion in France. 375 



HOAV FRANCE IS STIMULATING AGIUOULTURAL 

 PRODUCTION. 



The following is a translation of a circular issued by the French 

 Academy of Agriculture, and reproduced in La Revue de Viticulture 

 (Paris), of 8th March last: — 



"Appeal by the Academy of Agriculture to the Farmers of France. 



" Our agriculturists have not remained content with answering the 

 call of the country and fighting to defend the liberty and the rights of 

 France; they have struggled with the same valliance to assure the food 

 of the civil population as of our troops. We know what men, women, 

 and even chihlren have done in this respect, and how magnificent is 

 the efl^ort whicli they have developed. 



" To the hard work already done, to the services already rendered 

 to the homeland, a new effort must to-day be added, and agriculturists will 

 merit once again the esteem as well as the gratitude of their country. 



" Even forcigu nations suffer from the crisis which now exists in 

 all our country districts; hands are scarcer because labour is more sought 

 after in the factories which produce munitions of war: agricultural 

 production is more difficult and food prices are rising. !N"ecessary pur- 

 chases become day by day more onerous, if not more difficult, and trans- 

 port charges are increasing. 



" To save France from fresh expense, and in order to consecrate to 

 the National defence all our financial resources, it is from the land of 

 our country tliat new products must be demanded, it is to the farmer 

 that an appeal must be made to draw from our soil all that it can give. 



" To maintain, to assure, to develop even, our agricultural produc- 

 tion is to-day a necessity, it is a work of patriotism and of reason. 



" The Government understands this. It states it at the present hour; 

 in order to furnish labour to all our cultivators it has just decided that 

 agriculturists of the 1888 and 1889 classes shall be mobilized to the soil 

 (not to the front). It is also doing its utmost to favour the transport of 

 manures and to increase their production, notwithstanding difficulties 

 arising from the needs of National defence in chemical products. It 

 has obtained from the Senate the ratification of the double bonus for 

 wheat culture, which will permit farmers to receive for each quintal 

 (220 lbs.) the sum of 36 francs (28s. lOd.), and to draw, in addition, 

 20 francs for each hectare cropped over and above the previous year's area. 



" Let land-owners, farm managers, and agricultural labourers under- 

 stand on their part the role they have to play, the services which thev 

 can render, and the duties which are imposed upon them. 



" In the assurance of being preserved from the sufferings of famine 

 and from the anxietv which would be caused by deficient yields, the 

 entire population will wait with calm the approaching hour of victory. 



" Bv rendering this even more certain, the French agriculturist will 

 indeed have ' merited of the homeland.' " 



(Sgd.) Jules Develle, President. 



A. Hallet?. Vice-President. 

 Henry Saonier. Perpetual Secretary. 

 G. Wery, Vice-Secretary. 



