302 SCIENCE IN AFRICA 



sion by native cultivators of what at first glance appears to be 

 peculiarly non-native agriculture. Since both native and non- 

 native are coming to use the same elements in production, the real 

 division probably lies between those methods which do and do 

 not involve the investment of capital. 



Accordingly it has been found impossible to divide the subject 

 directly in accordance with the categories mentioned, but an 

 attempt has been made to treat native and European agriculture 

 separately. After an account of the organizations for agricultural 

 administration and research there follows a chapter on crop plants, 

 which discusses both native and non-native agriculture and sum- 

 marizes some recent advances in the fields of plant breeding and 

 methods of cultivation. General questions of plant industry are 

 treated in two sections of Chapter XIII, devoted respectively to 

 the practice of native and non-native peoples. Most of the prob- 

 lems of animal industry and animal disease are reserved for 

 Chapter XIV, but animal husbandry of necessity enters into a 

 discussion of mixed farming in Chapter XIII. The problem of 

 the deterioration and erosion of soils has already been discussed in 

 general terms in Chapter V, but it is of such great importance to 

 African agriculture that it is also mentioned here, especially in the 

 sections devoted to native agricultural practices. 



To the native peoples agriculture is an essential part of tribal 

 life and innovations are resisted through attachment to customary 

 methods and sometimes also through the influence of religious and 

 magical belief. In the past the enforcement of radical changes in 

 native methods has been advocated, but in recent years native 

 agricultural practice has been regarded as worthy of respect. It is 

 now coming to be realized that drastic methods rarely achieve 

 their object, and that improvements are more likely to be attained 

 by gradual development from existing methods. The first step 

 is to understand these methods and their reasons, just as has been 

 done in the study of agricultural science in Europe during the 

 past fifty years. Native methods are then submitted to scientific 

 analysis and experiment, and improvements, when discovered, 

 are encouraged through the medium of demonstration farms and 

 other forms of education. This procedure may not be applicable 

 to exotic crops such as cotton, coffee, or cacao, which are new to 



