October 28, 1920] 



NATURE 



295 



secondly, that this district may perhaps become the 

 larj»€St fruit-growing region in England; and, thirdly, 

 that among many growers profound ignorance exists 

 with respect to the preparation of fruit for market. 

 I believe that no administrator, save the rare 

 '■nius, can direct the expert, whereas the expert with 

 iiained scientific mind and possessed of a fair measure 

 of administrative ability can direct any but a genius 

 for administration. If the work of a Government 

 office is to be and remain purely administrative, no 

 creative capacity is required, and it may be left in the 

 sure and safe and able hands of the trained adminis- 

 trator; but if the work is to be creative it must l>e 

 under the direction of minds turned as only research 

 cnn turn them — in the direction of creativeness. To the 

 (hnically initiated initiation is easy and attractive, 

 . the uninitiated it is difficult and repugnant. The 

 useful work that such a staff as 1 have indicated 

 would find to do is well-nigh endless. It would become 

 a bureau of information in national horticulture, and 

 the know-ledge which it acquired would be of no less 

 use to investigators than to the industry. Diseases 

 ravage our orchards and gardens ; some are known to 

 be remediable and yet persist, others require immediate 

 and vigorous team-wise investigation, and yet continue 

 "^ be investigated by solitary workers or single 

 -earch institutions. Certain new varieties of some 

 ^iift fruits are known to be better than the older 

 v.irieties, and' yet the latter continue to be widely 

 ( ultivated. The transport and distribution of perish- 

 able fruit ;irc' often inadequate -" making a famine 

 where abundance lies." The information gathered in 

 during the constant survey of the progress of horti- 

 culture would serve not only to direct educational 

 'fort into useful channels, but to stimulate and assist 

 • -search. 



The tacit assumption which has so far underlain 

 my address is that an extension of intensive cultiva- 

 tion in this countrv is desirable. I have indicated that 

 areas are to be discovered where soil and climate are 

 f ivourable to this form of husbandry, and that bv the 



• -lablishment of a proper form of research — adminis- 

 tritive—and educational organisation the already high 

 standard reached by intensive cultivators may be sur- 

 Diissed. It remains to inquire whether anv large 

 increase in the area under intensive cultivation is, in 

 fact, either desirable or probable. 



The dispassionate inquirer will find his task by no 

 means easy. He should, as a preliminary, endeavour 

 to discern in the present welter of cosmic disturbance 

 what are likely to be the economic conditions of the 

 politician's promised land — the new world which was 

 :<• be created from the travail of war. In the first 

 I.ice, and no matter how academic he mav be, he 

 mnot fail to recognise the fact that costs of pro- 

 duction, including labour, are at least twice, and 

 probably two and a half times, those of pre-war days. 



• ind he must assume that the increase is permanent 

 .ind not unlikely to augment. What this means to 

 the different forms of cultivation mav be iudped from 

 the followintr estimates of capital costs of cultivation 

 of different kinds : 



Labour ami Capital for Farming and Intensive 

 Cultivation. 



I-«bour pw Caplul per flcrt . 



loo «TM. Pn-wyt, Prc««ot. 



Mm. jC C 



Mixed Farmini; 3-5 10 30-35 



I niit and vtKelable (growing 30-j0 50 IOO-135 

 cntive cullivaijon in the 



open (French Kaidening) 300 750 t,joo-i,875 



Cultivation under clau ... tO-300 3,000 4,000-5,000 

 NO. 2661, VOL. 106] 



In the second place, the inquirer is bound to assume 

 that the intensive cultivator of the future, like his 

 predecessor in the past, will have to be prepared to 

 lace the competition of the world. 



But, on the other hand, he may find some comfort 

 in the fact that both immediately before and, still 

 more, after the war, the standard of living both 

 in this country and throughout the world was, 

 and is still, rising. Hence he may perhaps expect a 

 less severe competition from foreign growers, and 

 also a better market at home. He may also derive 

 comfort from the reflection that the increased cost of 

 production which he must bear must also, perhaps in 

 no less measure, be borne by his foreign competitors. 

 Even before the war ^ cost of production of one of 

 the chief horticultural crops — apples— was no higher 

 in this country than in that of our main competitors. 

 There are also certain other apparently minor, but 

 really important, reasons for optimism with regard 

 to the prospects of intensive cultivation. -■Xmong these 

 is the increasing use of road in lieu of rail transport 

 for the marketing of horticultural produce. The 

 advantages of motor over rail transport for the car- 

 riage of perishable produce for relatively short dis- 

 tances — say up to 75 miles from market — lie in its 

 greater punctuality, economy of handling, and elas- 

 ticity. Fruit crops ripen rapidly and more or less 

 simultaneously throughout a given district. They 

 must be put on the market forthwith or are useless. 

 .\ train service, no matter how well organised, does 

 not seem able to cope with gluts, and hence it arises 

 that a season of abundance in the country rarely 

 means a like plenty to the consumer. Increasing 

 knowledge of food values, together with the general 

 rise in the standard of living, also present features 

 of good, augury to the intensive cultivator. 

 Jam and tomatoes and primeurs may be taken as 

 texts. 



In 1914 the consumption of jam in the United 

 Kingdom amounted to about a spoonful a day 

 per person. The more exact figures are 2 oz. 

 per week, or 126,000 tons per annum. It is 

 difficult to estimate the area under jam-fruit 

 — plums, strawberry, raspberry, currants, etc. — 

 required to produce this tonnage, but it may 

 be put at between 10,000 and 20,000 acres. Bv 

 i_qi8, thanks to the wisdom of the .Army authori- 

 ties in insisting on a large ration of jam for the 

 troops, and thanks also to the scarcity and quality of 

 margarine, the consumption of jam had more than 

 doubled. From 126,000 tons in 1914 it reache<l 

 340,000 tons in 1918. To supply this ration would 

 require the prtxiuce of from 25,000 to so,ooo acres of 

 orchard, which in turn would directly employ the 

 labour of, say, from 5000 to 10,000 men. Yet even 

 the_ tonnage consumed in 19 18 allows only a meagre 

 ration of little more than a couple of spoonsful a day. 

 It may therefore be anticipated that if, as is probable, 

 albeit only because of the immanence of margarine, 

 the new-found public taste for jam endures, fruit- 

 growers in this country will find a consider- 

 able and profitable extension in supplying this 

 demand. 



The remarkable increase in consumption which the 

 tomato has achieved would seem to support this con- 

 elusion. Fifty years ago, as Mr. Robbins has men- 

 tioned in his paper on " Intensive Cultivation " 

 (Journal of the Board of Agriculture. vo\.x\v.. No. 12, 

 March, 1919). this fruit was all but unused as a food. 

 To-day the production in this country amounts to 

 upwards of 45,000 tons. Yet the demand for tomatoes 

 ha.s incrensetl so rapidly— the appetite growing by 

 what it feed* upon— that the imports in 191^ from 

 the Channel Islands, Holland, France, PoVtugal, 



