ECONOMIC SOLUTIONS 119 



would undergo amendment during the session author- 

 izing banks to make loans on the products of the farm, 

 even including live stock. There are hints that oppo- 

 sition has arisen and that the hill will be withdrawn. 

 Such an outcome would constitute a call to our farmers 

 to form co-operative banking associations. There may 

 be other reasons for such action. Our banking system 

 is highly centralized. There are but five and twenty 

 banks in Canada. Two dozen bank managers control 

 the available liquid savings of the Dominion. It might 

 prove in the interest of national well-being that another 

 system of banking should arise to offset such centraliza- 

 tion. 



Germany has a highly effective form of rural co- 

 operative banking. In 18-17 F. Raiffeisen, Burgo- 

 master of Flammersfeld, finding that the farmers of his 

 district could borrow only at usurious rates, formed co- 

 operative unions of the better-off citizens to loan to the 

 poorer. No profit was sought. The principle was dis- 

 interested love. After fifteen years, Raiffeisen con- 

 fessed failure; unions based on this principle had no 

 vitality. He then formed co-operative loan banks. 

 Farmers in a defined district syndicate their farm lands 

 under negotiable Ijonds which arc offered jointly as 

 security for the credit the society needs. The indi- 

 vidual farmer then borrows from this society. The 

 Central Co-operative Bank of Prussia co-ordinates the 

 societies. The source-book for information upon their 

 working is Volume I,, Monographs on Agricultural 

 Co-op(;ratioii, the International Institute of Agricul- 

 ture, Rome. TlnTe are over 1G,000 of the co-operative 

 societies, united in fifty-two federations, all united in 

 the Central Co-c)j)erative Bank. Their loans to farmers 

 in 10 10 amounted to $:i,800,00(),0()(). The average 



