106 DEPENDENCE OF ARABLE FARMING 



rule he evades the intensity of foreign competition by 

 producing only vegetables, fruit or milk, which are 

 naturally protected by the necessity of freshness and 

 the relatively heavy cost of freights. But these mar- 

 kets cannot be indefinitely extended. Milk is already 

 wholly produced at home ; vegetables and fruit imported 

 from foreign countries only amount to £6 millions in 

 value, representing the production of perhaps 300,000 

 acres of land, which leaves the main business of agri- 

 culture untouched. Moreover, it is not be expected 

 that the small holder will be left in sole possession of 

 the fruit and vegetable market ; the more unremunera- 

 tive ordinary arable farming becomes, the more will 

 the large producer tend to turn his energies into 

 channels that still offer the prospects of profit and where 

 his powers of wholesale working will enable him to 

 compete successfully with the small holder. In fact, 

 both small and large farmers are in the same boat : the 

 returns of both depend upon prices that are fixed in 

 the main by foreign competition to supply the staple 

 articles of production — wheat and meat, because these 

 prices in their turn determine the extent of the in- 

 ternal competition to secure a share in the production 

 of the articles that are naturally protected, like fruit 

 and vegetables and milk. 



It follows from this argument that if the State, for 

 reasons of national security and insurance against 

 the effects of war, must obtain a larger production of 

 food at home and greater employment upon the land, 

 which can only be effected by an increase in the area 

 of arable cultivation, it cannot leave agriculture to the 

 unrestricted play of foreign competition, but must 

 ensure that the farmers' returns do not fall below a 



