io THE FARMER'S OUTLOOK 



becomes an article of export, involves an organi- 

 sation, on lines similar to those of other highly 

 developed manufactures. Bulk and uniform 

 quality are essential. The retail salesman wel- 

 comes the better-organised product, and refuses 

 the small quantities of uneven quality offered 

 by the home producer. Not impossibly the 

 erstwhile producer may himself become a pur- 

 chaser of the imported article. 



Idiosyncrasies of diet are tending to disappear. 

 A demand is created for certain foodstuffs which 

 have come to be regarded as the standard necessi- 

 ties of a civilised community. Popular prejudice 

 associates some article of diet with a lower social 

 status. Rye bread is discarded in Germany, 

 or rice in Japan. In both cases larger demands 

 on the world's wheat supplies result. 



The play of world forces in settling the pro- 

 duction and demand for foodstuffs suggests the 

 root cause of the rise in prices. Trade has brought 

 about the intercourse between nations. The 

 manufacturing system has caused its wide exten- 

 sion. A truism — but one which must be insisted 

 on at the outset of the investigation upon which 

 we are engaged. The growth of manufactures 

 and the corresponding increase in the number of 

 those engaged in winning minerals to provide 

 the workshops with raw materials, and coal, the 

 motive power of manufacture and transport, is 



