August, 1922 



SCIENTIFIC AGRICULTURE 



387 



Rural Economics 



Abstracts of four Itctures delivered by W. T. Jackman. University of Toronto, 



at the C.S.T.A. Convention. 



I. — What is Rural Economics? 



Until very recently most of the agricul- 

 tural colleges devoted their entire time to 

 the subjects pertaining to production, with 

 the object of improving the quality or in- 

 creasing the quantity of the things produced. 

 But in recent years it has been noted that 

 no matter how much greater the farmers 

 production may be nor to what extent he 

 devotes himself to the development of im- 

 proved breeds of live stock or better grains, 

 his returns from his enterprise do not keep 

 pace with these improvements of agricul- 

 tural technique and he has been led to in- 

 quire into the reasons for this fact and to 

 some means of obtaining a more adequate 

 return. This has brought him into contact 

 with the economics of agriculture. The 

 farmer has found that he has to deal with a 

 commercial mechanism, controlled by econ- 

 omic principles and acting according to 

 economic laws. He must buy from and sell 

 through this mechanism. He has become a 

 part of it whether he will or not. He is an 

 integral element in this commercial mechan- 

 ism in which he is caught, and. finding that 

 he must do business through this medium, 

 he has been compelled to turn his attention 

 to a study of the forces which operate with- 

 in this trading and industrial organism, that 

 is, to the economics of business. He re- 

 cognizes that agriculture must be run upon 

 business principles if it is to be successful, 

 and, consequently, he is keenly interested in 

 those subjects of study which we may group 

 under the heading of rural economics. 



What is rural economics? Briefly, we may 

 say that it is general economic principles ap- 

 plied to the problems of agriculture. To use 

 an analogy, we may note that chemistry is 

 divided into many divisions, such as agri- 

 cultural chemistry, industrial chemistry, phy- 

 sical chemistry, electro chemistry, etc., each 

 of which is the application of the general 

 knowledge of chemistry to the special field 

 of which it treats. In each of these subdivi- 

 sions of this science the results attained fre- 

 quently aid in clarifying the principles or 



facts upon which general chemistry is built; 

 and not infrequently the knowledge gained 

 in a special field comes back to enrich the 

 storehouse of knowledge of the general 

 science from which it proceeded. In the 

 language of Longfellow: "That which the 

 fountain sends forth returns again to the 

 fountain." So, in the case of agricultural 

 economics, we have an offshoot from the 

 science of economics. Its inception is in 

 general economic principles and it is de- 

 pendent upon them. The results secured 

 from the study of agricultural economics 

 have served to emphasize and occasionally 

 correct, while at the same time making more 

 vital and concrete the study of general econ- 

 omics. It is evident, then, that while the 

 pursuit of the field of rural economics pro- 

 ceeds or sets out from general economic 

 principles the latter must also be the goal of 

 return ; the truth in rural economics must be 

 tested by the general economic principles. 



Moreover, there has arisen to-day the 

 demand for a science which will give counsel 

 concerning the practical conduct of present 

 farm undertakings. Success in agriculture, 

 as in any other business, is measured by the 

 income obtained, not by the physical amount 

 of product derived from merely technological 

 processes. It is one thing to increase the 

 amount or quality of the product; it is an- 

 other thing to secure increased income from 

 these sources. Plant breeding, animal hus- 

 bandry, horticulture, etc.. by increasing the 

 amount or character of the physical product 

 tend to increase the farmer's income; but 

 tliere are so many economic factors which 

 act to nullify this that" unless the farmer can 

 make economic principles his guide his larger 

 productivity may be rewarded by an income 

 smaller than before. But a thorough know- 

 ledge of economics is just as valuable to him 

 as is a knowledge of the plant and animal 

 life with which he has to deal ; and unless he 

 acts upon economic principles when in con- 

 tact with a business organization governed 

 by economic laws, he cannot expect to be 

 able to secure the highest rewards of his en- 

 terprise. 



