122 



19 Aufutt, 1919.] 



ROYAL COMMISSION ON AQRICULTI UK. 

 SIB THOMAS 11. MIDDLETON, K.iu: . O.B. 





ourn. My rwwou for that i Uu, that alter wo pass 

 bout Uiu .,000,000 acrun limit lor total corn, < 

 oogiii to encroach upou luntl which ut !<** suitable lor 

 uoru production, aud a relatively rapid increase in 

 the price would be necessary to bring that land inu> 

 cultivation. Under existing condition* 1 am doubt- 

 ful, if even a market price of lous. per quarter 

 for the next 6 years, that wu should get to 4,000,000 

 ores of wheat m England and Wales. 



1 now turn to Appendix 15, dealing with M .in- 

 duction, b irst a word a* to the prices used in esti- 

 mating the cost of meat production. Wu \\i-n- ijuiu- 

 familiar in the years before the war, with making 

 estimates of the cost of meat production, allow mg 

 what one might describe as conventional ligure* tor 

 the crops grown on the tarm ; and 1 have louou ed the 

 same procedure in estimating the cost ol meat pro- 

 duction in the years succeeding the war. 1'he 

 liguros which 1 have taken for the pre-war period in 

 the particular case 1 have assumed in Appendix it 

 are as follows: 1 have supposed that roots could be 

 grown for tie. Sd. per ton, oat straw 30s., meadow 

 hay 008., seeds hay 60s. per ton. Before the war, 

 linseed cake, after deducting manurial value, cost 

 6 10s. per ton; Egyptian cotton cake cost 

 i.3 16s. In the post-war period, that is to say, 

 for this coming year, 1 should explain to farmers 

 present that in taking the figure of 15s. for roots 

 and of 60s. for meadow hay, 1 have not actually 

 taken the crops of the coining year. These crops arc- 

 about two-thirds, or less than two-thirds, ol tin 

 average crops; and I thought that as I was attempt- 

 ing to make an estimate for something like a 6-year 

 period, it would be undesirable to take this abnormal 

 crop into account. My figures, therefore, refer to the 

 post-war cost of an average crop of hay or an average 

 crop of roots. With regard to linseed cake 1 have 

 been obliged to take the figure which we presume will 

 rule during next winter, namely, 25 10s. le.- 

 manurial value 3 10s., giving a net cost of JL22 ; 

 and in the case of Kgyptian cotton cake a net cost of 

 17 10s. per ton. 



Now passing over the details of the estimate, which 

 1 shall be glad to answer questions upon, 1 draw atten- 

 tion to the summary on the fifth page of the Appendix 

 --Summary 1. 1 estimate that in the year 1913-14 two- 

 year-old cattle sold at about 23 months old would have 

 "incurred a cost of 18 in production. The correspond- 

 ing figure for next winter, apart from the fact that the 

 hay and root crop.-, are abnormal, would be 36 4s. 6d. 

 In other words, the cost per cwt. before the war was 

 bout 36s. lOd. The cost per cwt. at the present time 

 is about 73s. lOd. If, as is more usual, the cattle 

 were kept on for another 10 or 11 months, and 

 slaughter at, say, 34 months old, the pre-war cost of 

 producing a three-year-old would be about 25 ; post- 

 war cost, 47 to 48; cost per cwt., 40s. and 36s. 7d. 

 respectively. 



I have prepared a second summary, with the 

 object of snowing on which periods of the animal's 

 existence the heavy cost has fallen. All who 

 are accustomed to rear and keep cattle know that 

 summer increase, provided that you are rearing the 

 animal yourself, is purchased at much less cost than 

 winter increase. I have analysed, therefore, the 

 difference in cost between summer and winter in- 

 crease on the next page. We will take the cattle 

 slaughtered at 34 months old. The animal as a calf 

 cost before the war about 33s. 7d. per cwt. to pro- 

 duce; now 50s. 8d. The next increase which was got 

 in the winter months cost before the war about 63s., 

 and costs at the present time about 103s., and so on. 

 The last summer's grazing cost before the war about 

 28s. ; it now costs 43s. The last winter's feeding 

 (this is the important point) oost liefor<- the war 

 about 48s., and costs now. assuming that the hay and 

 root cropH are normal, about 133s. per live <-i. So 

 that, relatively speaking, there lias lx>on n much 

 higher increase in tho pout of making meat during the 

 winter than there lias l>een in the cost of growing 

 wheat, according to my figures, and that li 

 mainly due to tho very high oost of feedlllM&uff*. 

 The ono point that 1 wi.sh to direct attention to 

 here, apart from the alteration in post, in the 

 great increase in the cost of winter fix-ding as com- 

 pared with the cost of gras* feeding. 



1 do not know whether, before 1 proceed, you would 

 -.<> put questions on these two sets of estimates. 

 We re dealing now with twtimau*> of cost of pro- 

 duction, and it might be convenient tor members who 

 are present to put questions on these estimates before 

 we proceed. 



3011. The C'Auinnun: My view is, 1 think, that you 

 uhould complete your statement:'' Very well. Thet>e 

 ligures, that is to say, the figures which 1 havu 

 read relating to the cost ot rearing cattle in 

 summer and in winter, point straight to the peculuu 

 conditions which in one sense have been the salvation, 

 and in another the curse, of British husbandry during 

 the past half century. We possess a relatively large 

 area of land equally suited for tillage or for grazing. 

 The comparative ease with which the change could be 

 made saved many farmers from bankruptcy in the 

 first half of the last 50 years tin- first half of the 

 period, and it was the ease with which that change 

 was made, and the fact that most of our land had 

 gone, down to grass that constituted the special 

 dangers with which we were laced in the years 1917 

 and 1918, a danger which it was the time turn of the 

 Food Production Department to attempt t ininli.it 



I submit that you have got to consider not only 

 one agricultural industry, but two agricultural indus- 

 tries, for there are two very distinct agricultural 

 industries in the country, namely, tillage farming and 

 grass farming. If we take the 27,000,000 acres of 

 England and Wales, and deduct from them Home 

 4,000,000 to 5,000,000 acres, which for one reason or 

 another would be tilled under any probable condi- 

 tions that will arise in the near future, stud ako 

 some 7,000,000 to 9,000,000 acres which would remain 

 in grass however tempting the corn prices might be, 

 there remain from 13,000,000 to 16,000,000 acres in 

 England and Wales to which this particular problem 

 of the alternate industries applies \\ , have twj 

 industries possible on from 13,000,000 to 16.000,000 

 acres of land. 



So far as one can forecast tho economic prospects 

 of grass farming, I should class them as good on per- 

 haps two-thirds, and fair 011 the remainder ol the, 

 intermediate area. ' By the intermediate area 1 mean 

 the 13,000,000 to 16,000,000 acres of England and 

 Wales. The country is likely to pay a price lor it* 

 milk which will ensure, to the grass farmer at least, 

 a satisfactory return; and even were the prices of 

 cattle and sheep to fall below the probable rates in 

 tho near future, grass land could be managed w> a- to 

 yield certain profits. The outlay in wages is small, 

 and much grass land could be cheaplv improved bv 

 manuring. Grass land generally is worse farmed than 

 tillage land, and the efforts now being made by the 

 Agriculture Education Committees in every county 

 ure more likely to result in improvements on grass 

 land than on tillage land, because the scope for 

 improvement is greater and the methods of im- 

 provement are more direct and simple. Tillage farm- 

 ing represents a very different, set of conditions: a 

 heavy outlay of capital, a high wages bill, more risks 

 from weather, very uncertain prices and much harder 

 work. Apart from any State intervention, 1 would 

 class the prospects of the tillage farmer in the im- 

 mediate future as being fair upon one-fourth only of 

 the " intermediate" area and as being very doubtful 

 on the bulk of the remainder of the " inU-rme<i 

 area. 



Now looking at the subject from the national stand- 

 point, the first essential is that the agricultural in- 

 dustry should be in a thriving state. It ia better to 

 have prospered as grass farming than to have bank- 

 rupt tillage land. Bankrupt tillage land is extraor- 

 dinarily wasteful in our climate. Reasonable pro- 

 duction can only be secured in exceptionally good 

 seasons on land which I describe as bankrupt; and the 

 result is that there is a great waste in the labour 

 expended upon the cultivation. Provided that, the 

 industry pavs its way. then- i^- no comparison from tin- 

 national standpoint between tillage and grass farm- 

 ing. The gross value of tin- produce is more than 

 doubled in tillage farming, the food provided in in- 

 rreaiwd four-fold to eight-fold, rind the wage** fund in 



