AGRARIAN TENDENCIES IN EUROPE 63 



Australia 1. The population of Holland has 

 doubled in the last forty years. There are 200,000 

 farms in this little country at present, and the only 

 means of increasing this number is to reclaim ad- 

 ditional land from the sea or further to subdivide 

 existing farms. The average acreage of the Dutch 

 farms is relatively small, consisting of approximately 

 20 hectares or 50 acres. More intensive cultivation 

 may make it possible to subdivide these farms. It 

 is obvious that the process cannot go on indefinitely. 

 It is necessary, therefore, for the farmers of Hol- 

 land to exert every effort, to utilize every scientific 

 truth, and to apply every economic principle as a 

 means of sustaining the prosperity of their country. 

 In Italy there has been a tendency to divide up 

 the family holdings in recent years. In 1912 the 

 number of landowners was estimated at nearly five 

 million. Of this number, approximately 2,325,000 

 possessed less than one hectare, or two and a half 

 acres of land. But the number of landowners at 

 the present time exceeds seven and a half million. 

 The tendency to increase the number of landowners 

 and reduce the size of farms in many parts of Europe 

 has intensified the system of cultivation, which un- 

 der normal economic conditions would greatly in- 

 crease agricultural production. 



The Cooperative Movement in Agriculture 



No influence of the agrarian movement has been 

 more significant than that of agricultural coopera- 





