MINUTES OF EVIDENCE. 



27 



16 September, 191'J.] 



MK. L. N. GOODING. 



[Continued. 



9712. What is the reason for the decline in the 

 amount of receipts from poultry on Farm " D " ? 

 We did not keep so many fowls; we gave up 



keeping turkeys-. 



9713. Would you look for a moment at these costs 

 of production at the bottom of page 7? You have 

 wheat after clover and then you have roots and then 

 you have barley? On the mixed soil? 



9714. Yes. Which farm would they correspond 

 with here? Ihey are not based on any of these 

 farms; they an- based on the average cost for the 

 mixed-soil land in the County of Norfolk. 



9715. You would not compare the mixed soil on 

 which you estimated these costs with the mixed soil 

 on farm "!)''? Farm "D" is a mixed-soil farm, 

 but the costs referred to there only refer to that 

 particular farm and not to mixed soil of the same 

 class in the -.vhilc of the county. The estimated cost 

 of growing who it on that class of land has been care- 

 fully gone through by the Committee of farmers with 

 me, and these costs represent what they consider to 

 be the correct estimated average cost for that class 

 of land. 



9716. Would farm " D " be representative of that 

 class of land? it is more inclined to bo light land 

 than mixed foil; part of it is very good and part of 

 it is very light. 



9717. The estimated cost of wheat production is 

 14 18s. and for oats 12 16s. and for barley 13 

 ls. ? Yes. 



9718. That i<i an average cost of nearly 14 an 

 acre ? Y'es. 



9719. What sort of rotation do you follow on this 

 mixed land four course? Yes, the rotation on the 

 mixed soil would be wheat, roots, barley and layer. 



9720. So that you have two crops missing here 

 rout . and clover? Yes. 



9721. What would your roots crop cost? Have you 

 any idea of it!' I have not worked that out. It 

 dcjH-mls upon the class of roots whether it is turnips 

 or mangolds or swedes --it varies so. 



'.t~'2'2. Would the cost of growing roots be something 

 like the cost of growing an acre of hay? Probably 

 more. 



9723. Could you tell me anything like the propor- 

 tion of the number of acres of arable land there are 

 on this farm "D"? Farm "D" has 626 acres of 

 arable. 146 of pasture and 329 of heath. 



9724. Out of the 1,100 acres? Yes. 



9725. There is very little expenditure on the heath, 

 I presume? Yes. 



9726. So that the expenditure is incurred mainly 

 <m the 626 acres of arable and the 146 acres of 

 pasture? Yes. 



9727. It is rather strange, when you begin to look 

 at these estimates, to see that you have three crops 

 which average 14 an acre and you say your roots 

 would cost you more than that. " Clover would not 

 cost you so much as any of them? That is so. 



9728. Anyhow, you would have an average cost of 

 something like 10 an acre, but your average expendi- 

 ture in 1916 and 1917 was a little under 3 an acre. 

 If it had doubled between 1916 and 1917 and the 

 present time it would only give you 6 an acre? 

 That is wrong. The account I have given for this 

 farm " D " is not a receipt and payment account, but 

 the profit and loss account; it simply shows the 

 balance in each case. 



!7'J!. K.vii.-u me, it is expenditure on farm " D " 

 on labour, feeding stuff;,, corn cake, seed corn, general 

 expenses, tithe, rates and taxes, implements and 

 horses, which are surely the main items that enter 

 into the cost of production <m any farm. I do not 

 know any important item that is not included. One 

 would expect that the total cost of production spread 

 over the whole acreage of the farm would somewhat 

 correspond with the figures for 1916 and 1917, but 

 you have to multiply u about four times to get at 

 your present cost of production figure. I want to 

 bring home to yon the possibility that there is of very 



.t Cost of production? I 



must say your siipjKisition is not (|iiite correct. The 

 Icdanee >,heet I have given for farm " D " is merely 

 u profit and loss account. For install''-, there is 



nothing on the side of expenditure for stock bought. 

 It is not like farm " A " account, which is a receipt 

 and payment account showing the live stock and the 

 corn seeds bought and other things like that; it is 

 merely a posting of the balances to the profit and 

 loss account in the ledger. I did not attempt to get 

 it out the other way, or I should have shown it as 1 

 did in the case of farm " A." 



9730. When you came here before, you showed us 

 some rather high costs for light land farming in 

 Norfolk, did you not? I showed you what I con- 

 sidered was the actual cost at the present time. 



9731. I am sorry I have not got the figures before 

 me at the moment? I have them here, if you want 

 them. 



9732. Will you tell me the figure for wheat and 

 barley and oats in the case of light land? Wheat was 

 Cll_4s. 4d., oats 7 18s. Id., and barley 7 18s. 3d. 



9733. On page 10 you give a summary of three crops 

 which gives you an average of 9 2s.? Yes. 



9734. If you look at farm " A," which is a repre- 

 sentative farm of that character of land, you have 

 got a total payments expenditure in 1917-18 of 4,800 

 and a total, including the valuation, of 8,239. Your 

 expenditure there is about 6 an acre and your crop 

 expenditure runs you to 9? Of course, the average 

 per acre would be less than 9, because it does not 

 cost so much for the seeds, for instance. 



9735. Yes, I admit that. Would you turn to the 

 cost of production, on page T? Take first wheat: 

 what place would this crop of wheat take in the 

 rotation? That is the mixed soil? 



9736. Yes? The wheat would come after tho layer 

 in most cases in the mixed soil. 



9737. That is the fourth year removed from the 

 fallow from the root crop? The third year from 

 the root crop three years after the root crop. 



9738. How do you get at the 1 10s.? I estimate 

 the proportion of the cost of cleaning the land for 

 the root crops that should be spread over the other 

 crops at 6 an acre. 



9739. The root crop, as a matter of fact, in this 

 case was a 1917 root crop, and if you are costing for 

 this-year's wheat crop do you divide it equally between 

 the three or four following crops? I take 1 10s. 

 for the wheat, 2 10s. for the barley, and 2 for the 

 layer as the cost of cleaning the land; the other 

 portion of the cleaning would be borne by the root 

 crop. 



9740. How do you value the farmyard manure P I 

 put it in at 5s. a load. 



9741. What is the 5s. for? The manurial value 

 of it. 



9742. The manurial value of what? Of the fsim- 

 yard muck. 



9743. Is it from the purchased feeding stuffs ! J 

 Yes, it would be, principally. 



9744. Are you sure about that? Partly from that 

 and partly from roots consumed on the 1'arm. 



9745. Any straw? Yes, the straw is included in 

 the muck, but I have not included the value of the 

 straw in that. If I had included the value of the 

 straw I should have put it in at more than 5s. a load. 

 I left th-> value of the straw out on both sides. 



9746. You have a long list of operations here; is 

 it your practice to carry out all these operations? 

 We should, in the ordinary way, to farm properly 

 and to keep the land clean. 



9747. Again I am a little bit troubled about them, 

 because, for instance, you do not get any amount of 

 labour employed on land of this character. If you 

 take your first farm, you have 16 men and women and 

 boys employed on over 1,000 acres, and I rather think 

 they could not carry out all these operations? There 

 are only 506 acres of arable on the farm. 



9748. That gives you just over three workers to the 

 100 acres? Yes. 



9749. In that case you could not handle all those 

 500 acres with only three per 100 acres? We have 

 not been able to do it lately, but I thought on work- 

 ing out the estimates that it was only correct to work 

 them out having regard to how the land can be kept 

 in proper order and the cost of producing corn under 

 proper conditions. 



