AGRICULTURAL PROGRESS 41 



Progress in Agriculture. In 1910 the Agricultural 

 Department was reorganised on a better basis than 

 formerly, and the purely forestry work, which had been 

 previously carried on by the Agricultural Superintendent, 

 in addition to his other duties, was then transferred to a 

 Forestry Department formed in that year. 



Briefly, the scheme of work laid down by the new 

 Department of Agriculture may be said to be on the follow- 

 ing chief lines : 



(i) The introduction of a cheap and effective organic 

 manure, and the demonstration of its value in such a 

 manner as to induce the people to use it on then* land, 

 and thereby to employ more economical means for the 

 production of food, etc. 



(ii) The institution of a proper rotation of crops suitable 

 for each district or locality. 



(iii) The demonstration to natives of the fact, that, by 

 the proper employment of manuring and crop rotation, 

 they would be able to farm the same piece of land for an 

 indefinite number of years, during which time it should 

 increase rather than diminish in fertility. By such de- 

 monstration it should be possible to put an end to the 

 wasteful and permanently destructive methods at present 

 employed of shifting cultivation. 



The Agricultural Department has a piece of land on 

 the Experiment Farm at Njala, which has been under 

 crops annually for the past eight years, and the condition 

 of it at present is said to be a more fertile one, owing to 

 the system of manuring and rotation employed, than it 

 was at the commencement of work. This is mentioned 

 here, as it is in contradiction to the well-worn native excuse 

 for changing the site of farms annually, i.e., that it is 

 essential for the maintenance of the fertility of land that 

 after a few years' cultivation the " bush " be allowed to 

 become re-established so that, on burning, a sufficient 

 amount of wood ash may be obtained to renovate it. 



(iv) To encourage the natives in the formation of 

 permanent plantations of fruit and other economic trees. 



To these ends, in the first place, analyses of soils from 

 various parts of the country have been made by the 

 Imperial Institute. At the same time samples of the soil 

 taken from localities where kola, cocoa, rice and ground- 

 nuts were grown, have been compared with that from 



