TEMPERATE SURPLUS-PRODUCING REGIONS 103 



surplus supplies will be sufficient in the near future to make the 

 total surplus of animal foodstuffs, plus feedstuffs, from temperate 

 North and South America combined, much greater than it was in 

 the period 1900-4. 



Australasia has developed great importance in exports both of 

 meat and of dairy produce. It is almost certain that, with the 

 growth of population and of better means of transport to the ports, 

 there will be a steady increase in the exportable surplus of both of 

 these classes of produce. Feedstuffs are scarcely exported at all 

 from Australasia, and there is little likelihood of their being so in 

 the future, owing to its marked suitability for animal-rearing and 

 the high freight charges on feedstuffs to Western Europe. Dairy 

 produce may increase more rapidly than meat in export trade. 

 With reference to all animal foodstuffs taken together, however, 

 no great relief in the event of a general world-shortage, is to be 

 expected from Australasia. 



Eastern Europe and Siberia have recently been the most con- 

 siderable source of surplus animal feedstuffs, and are therefore 

 of the greatest importance to the animal-rearing industries of 

 Western Europe. In foodstuffs their chief importance lies in 

 Siberian butter and Russian and Austro-Hungarian eggs. In all 

 these directions there is room for expansion, which depends mainly 

 upon improvements in the means of transport and the adoption 

 of more intelligent methods of farming. The latter, if realised, 

 might well result in an increase in the crop-yields per acre, and 

 thereby check the tendency for the cultivation of food-crops to 

 encroach upon land used directly or indirectly for the maintenance 

 of animals. The proximity of this area of supply to Western 

 Europe is a favourable condition for increased exports of animal 

 produce and feedstuffs in the future. In general, however, changes 

 and developments throughout this region are likely to be slow, so 

 that no great expansion can be expected in the near future, more 

 especially since the European War has had most disorganising 

 effects. 



Among the miscellaneous temperate regions, only China is of 

 note with regard to surplus animal produce or feedstuffs. Both 

 poultry products and oil-seeds and oilcakes have already been 

 considerable export items, and under favourable conditions may 

 increase greatly in the future. The remaining regions in this 

 division together have extensive latent stock-producing resources, 

 but will probably require the lapse of many years before they are 

 properly developed so as to produce an important surplus of meat 

 or meat products. 



A general review of the situation with reference to supplies from 

 all these regions brings out a number of conclusions : first, that 

 striking changes have been in progress in North America, which 

 indeed threatens to draw off supplies of certain kinds of animal pro- 

 duce from other countries instead providing a surplus of such 

 supplies ; second, that the total exported supplies of the world 



