A National PoUc}). 8i 



community to gfet away from such units and organise our 

 agriculture on the Hnes that will give us the best 

 economic results. The present distribution of land may 

 suit farmers because the amount of capital required for 

 those farms between lOo and 300 acres is within their 

 reach as individuals, but it is not in the interest of the 

 nation that we should be using capital and labour 

 uneconomically, merely because it suits the farmers. The 

 agricultural workers are vitally interested in this question 

 because their prospects depend on the most economic use 

 being made of their labour. The larger the output per unit 

 of labour employed the greater the margin from which 

 improvements can come. 



How far the cost of production can be lessened by 

 increasing the scale of operations in farming is a problem 

 for investigation. There seems no reason why on large 

 scale farms, economies in management, in the organisation 

 of labour, in the more effective use of modern machinery, 

 and in buying and selling on wholesale lines, should not be 

 the result as in other industries. Even more important 

 is the opportunity for economies in the use of land. It 

 is not possible to compute the waste that results from 

 the present arrangement of fields and farms, but it must 

 be very large. The unnecessary fences and hedges waste 

 a considerable area of land. In Oxfordshire alone, 

 according to Mr. C. S. Orwin, the roadside hedges occupy 

 an area of 1,500 acres. When the land was enclosed the 

 laying out of the fields was not arranged to make the 

 most effective use of the ground, but was done to suit the 

 various interests and to satisfy claimants. The result 



