FRIDAY, JUNE 26. MORNING SESSION, 



IO.3O A.M. 



Agricultural Credit Banks and Co-operative Societies. 



Chairman: THE RIGHT HON. SIR HORACE PLUNKETT, 

 K.C.V.O., F.R.S., late Vice-President, Department of 

 Agriculture and Technical Instruction for Ireland. 



THE CHAIRMAN : Professor Dunstan and Gentlemen We 

 are to deal to-day with a subject to which perhaps I may 

 attach undue importance, but as we have to deal with it in an 

 hour, that renders it impossible for me to do justice to the 

 subject without doing grievous injustice to those who have 

 prepared papers, and to those who wish to hear them. I 

 recognize that there is one limitation upon our discussions. 

 We are not here to treat of general principles, but rather of 

 their particular application to certain countries, so that I shall 

 devote the very few remarks I shall make to what you may 

 possibly find of suggestive value in the co-operative move- 

 ment generally in these islands. 



As we all know, the co-operative movement began in 

 England in the " hungry forties," and has extended since all 

 over the world in its various forms. The first thing that I 

 have to say about the co-operative movement in England is 

 that it hardly touched agriculture at all until the beginning 

 of the present century. In Ireland, on the other hand, just 

 a quarter of a century ago, the agricultural co-operative 

 movement was founded to deal with the special circumstances 

 of that country, and there are, I think, a few points in that 

 movement which are worthy of consideration from those who 

 come from tropical countries. Ireland, of course, is a country 

 where, meteorologically speaking, the temperature is low, 

 and I realize that I must remember the warning given to us 

 by the President of the Congress in his opening Address, 



