EXAMPLES FROM OTHER LANDS 33 



to look, as in the case of other European countries, to the 

 agricultural crisis that began to be felt about the year 1880. 

 The changes in production, the competition of foreign 

 supplies, the cheapening of sea transport and the altered 

 conditions of international trade first brought home to the 

 minds of the Dutch peasantry the need for association, 

 while later on this need was emphasised, in their case, by 

 the fact that certain producers in Holland were causing a 

 bad name to be given to Dutch produce by reason of the 

 inferior qualities thereof they were then sending to foreign 

 markets. 



It was, however, not until about 1890 that the movement 

 began to be taken up in Holland in real earnest. Among the 

 peasantry the idea of co-operative action in agricultural 

 production and sale was, down to that time, almost unknown. 

 All the same, it is mainly to the Dutch peasantry that the 

 subsequent rise and expansion of the said idea in their 

 country are due. The main lines of policy adopted by the 

 Dutch Government were those of, first helping to propagate 

 the principle of co-operation, and then leaving to the societies 

 the fullest possible choice in deciding for themselves the 

 form of their constitution according to one or other of four 

 different methods of association sanctioned by the laws of 

 Holland. The Government have also in recent years given 

 small subventions in support mainly of credit and cattle- 

 breeding societies. 



So well has the movement spread in this short period, 

 and under these particular conditions, that to-day the 

 number of co-operative agricultural societies in Holland 

 is 1,341, with a membership of about 135,000. 



Co-operative credit societies of the Raiffeisen type, and 

 forming dependencies of three central banks, whose head- 

 quarters are at Utrecht, Eindhoven and Alkmaar, have 

 more especially undergone a remarkable growth, the 46 

 banks, with 2,501 members, in 1899 having increased to 

 582 banks, with 40,840 members, by 1909. 



Co-operative purchase, mostly in regard to fertilisers and 

 concentrated foods for cattle, is carried on by the agricultural 



A.O. d 



