306 



STATISTICAL SURVEY OF IRISH AGRICULTURE. 



Adverting- to the contraction of the arable land of the country — this is, 

 of course, the outstanding feature of these returns, especially when the 

 process is regarded, not from year to year, but as an historical tendency. 

 The tendency is not, however, confined to Ireland alone of the countries of 

 the United Kingdom, though nowhere is its extent so strikmg. The arable 

 land of Great Britain in the year 1899, for example, was the smallest on 

 record. Since 1872 — with four checks in 1875, 1885, 1894, and 1897— the 

 extent of land under the plough in Great Britain has continuously declined. 

 The following statement illustrates the relative position of the countries of 

 the United Kingdom as regards the distribution of the several areas be- 

 tween arable and pastoral cultivation :■ — 



Proportion of Arable and Pastoral Lands in each Country of the United Kingdom. 



Arable Lands, . . 

 Pastoral Lands, 

 Total Cultivated Lands, 

 Arable %, 

 Pastoral %, 



England, 

 (Average 

 1897--99.) 



Wales, 

 (Average 

 1897--99.) 



11,506,000 



13.257.000 

 24,763,000 



46-5 

 53-5 



903,000 

 1,925,000 

 2,828,000 



319 

 68. 1 



Scotland, 

 (Average 

 1897--99.) 



3,508,000 

 1,386,000 

 4,894,000 



71.7 



28.3 



Ireland 

 1899. 



3,146,000* 

 12,070,000 

 15,216,000 



20.7 



79-3 



United 

 Kingdom. 



19,063,000 

 28,638,00(7 

 47,701,000 



40.0 



60.0 



* Including 13,086 acres "under Small Fruit and Fallow." 



More than half of the cultivated area of England is, it will be seen, no 

 longer under the plough. In Ireland the proportion of pastoral to arable 

 lands is 79.3 to 20.7 per cent; in Scotland the proportion is 28.3 to Ji.J 

 per 100 statute acres of cultivated land. I shall revert further on to the 

 significance of the very large amount of tillage in Scotland. t The geogra- 

 phical characteristics of Wales explain to a large degree the very high per 

 'Centage of her pasture lands, which enable her to produce close on 100 

 sheep more per 1,000 acres of total area than the joint flocks of Ireland and 

 .Scotland for the same area. 



It is noteworthy, to introduce a comparison with a foreign country, that, 

 while the area under meadows and pasture in Ireland is over eleven times 

 the similar area in Belgium, our herds of cattle number only slightly over 

 three times as many as those of that country. No doubt, it is generally 

 recognised that with a system of small farming, such as is carried on in 

 Belgium, more cattle can be raised to the acre by means of tillage and house- 

 feeding than on the grazing system ; but the fact just mentioned points to 

 the conclusion that pastoral farming — which means, so far as Ireland is 

 concerned, the production of meat, dairy products, and wool — great as its 

 expansion has been, has not, so far, developed at the rate at which the 

 agricultural resources of the country have been passing under its control. 

 One obvious feature — in part a cause and in part an effect — of the continued 

 contraction of the arable land of a country is a great displacement of popula- 

 tion. The exodus from the rural districts to the manufacturing districts of 

 England and the annual drain of emigration from this country are striking 

 evidences of the diverse operations of this tendency as it affects, on the one 

 hand, a country with gieat manufacturing resources, and, on the other, 

 -a country whose main industry is agriculture. The remarkable growth of 



t See page 322. 



