176 PRODUCTION 



second by increasing the imports of cereals and of concentrated 

 feedstuffs. 



If the factors in the cost of production of animal foodstuffs are 

 analysed under the main heads of land, labour and capital, it will 

 be found that the charges for each have increased during the last 

 twenty years. 



The limitations set by nature upon the areas of land available 

 under the present conditions has caused keen competition to arise 

 for the use of that land among the various forms of production. 

 Not only is the area limited, but the progress of settlement in the 

 newer countries appears to favour the spread of weeds, pests, and 

 plant diseases besides causing a reduction in the natural fertility. 

 The original flora and fauna are quickly killed out by the hand of 

 man, but later " soil fertility shows signs of depletion ; weeds, 

 fungus diseases and insect pests, unknown a generation ago, are 

 to be combated." 1 



The world's food requirements are such, it must be repeated, 

 that animal industries are bound to take second place, to become 

 residual, when limitations of productive area begin to be felt, 8 

 The most important and pressing need is for food crops, and the 

 production of these has been advancing at least as rapidly as the 

 consuming population has increased. The value of agricultural 

 land has risen rapidly in most countries owing to its comparative 

 scarcity in relation to the sum of all the demands made upon it. 

 The rise has been most startling in the new countries where large 

 areas of cheap land were still available twenty years ago for raising 

 meat-producing animals. Thus in the United States the value of 

 all farm lands is stated to have risen by 118% in the ten-year 

 period 1900 to 1910. 3 Similar increases have taken place in Canada, 

 Argentina, Siberia, New Zealand and in European countries such 

 as Germany and Holland. Although considerable areas of land, 

 that will ultimately be utilised for agricultural production, still 

 remain untouched in the newer countries, much of it is forested or 

 distant from the means of transport. The expense of clearing such 

 land is a capital charge upon it, 4 and the difficulty of obtaining 

 labour for this purpose tends to keep it out of cultivation. 



Land values and rent are an effect rather than a cause in the pro- 

 cess of agricultural production, and their levels arise from the 

 prices realised for the produce as a whole. When, however, one 

 group of agricultural industries is separated from all the groups 

 that compete together for the use of the available land, the price 

 which has to be paid for land or the (commercial) rent demanded 

 for its use, amounts in practice to a factor in the cost price of the 



1 U.S. Dept. Agric. Bureau of Statistics, Bulletin 73, p. 9. 



2 For a fuller discussion of this question, see Part II., Chap. v. 



3 Report of the 13th U.S. Census, Vol. V., p. 42. 



4 The expense of clearing forested land in Canada, for example, has been 

 estimated as ranging from 20 dollars to 125 dollars per acre. Dominions 

 Commission, (Cd. 8457), p. 16. 



