CEREALS 65 



sideration must have weighed heavily in the successive 

 decisions regarding their institution. 



Except in Bengal, where the permanent settlement 

 makes it unnecessary to maintain a regular revenue staff, 

 these forecasts are compiled by that staff. The statistics 

 for each minor tract are reported to the officer of the 

 Administrative District in which it is situated. He pre- 

 pares a return for the district, and reports it to the 

 Director of Agriculture in his particular province; and 

 the Director in turn reviews and, if necessary, modifies 

 the district returns in the light of such special knowledge 

 as he may possess, and then publishes the provincial 

 total, which he further reports for incorporation in the 

 General Memorandum. 



General Memoranda bring together the figures for all 

 India. Not only do the crop seasons vary somewhat as 

 between province and province, but the systems of land 

 tenure and revenue practice differ in a manner that 

 imposes diversity of practice in the preparation of 

 agricultural statistics. It thus happens that, although 

 an attempt is made to time the issue of the Memoranda 

 with regard to these diversities of conditions, the data 

 brought together in a single General Memorandum are 

 not strictly homogeneous either in nature or in respect 

 of time. Madras may be unable at first to report regard- 

 ing any but the tracts held under a particular form of 

 tenure. Agra and Oudh may be unable to make any 

 estimate of out-turn at a date when all the other provinces 

 do so. Some one or other tract may already have com- 

 pleted the reaping of a crop about whose yield certain 

 others are as yet able to make only a tentative conjecture. 



These points are sufficient to indicate that the so-called 

 forecasts have defects that are due primarily to the wide 

 diversity of conditions to be faced. They will explain 

 also why, in the earlier forecasts relating to a given crop, 

 comparison is made between the figure now estimated 

 and that which was estimated in the previous year and 

 group of years at the same stage of the crop. It has 

 sometimes been suggested that the new figure should 

 be compared with the complete and rectified figure for 

 the previous year; but it is obvious that comparison of 

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