ILLUSTRATIOX FARMS OF THE COMMITTEE ON LAYDS 13 



APPENDIX No. 3 



ILLUSTRATION FROM DENMARK. 



I have kept the committee longer than I intended this morning, but I want to 

 present the outlines of an illustration from Denmark and one from Ireland. I am 

 not going to divert your attention from the important matters, on which I am speak- 

 ing this morning, and I bring in these references to Denmark and Ireland only so 

 far as they indicate what may be done in Canada to meet our conditions. When I 

 went to Denmark first 25 years ago I learned that the leaders of the movement for 

 the improvement of agriculture there recognized the value of the teaching power of 

 the most successful farmers in the Kingdom. The Royal Agricultural Society by 

 means of grants enabled hundreds of young farmers to learn the systems and methods 

 of farming from many of the best farms in the country. These young farmers lived 

 and worked and learned on these selected farms. The period might be three months 

 or six months or a year; and sometimes a young farmer would woiflc on two, three, 

 or even four such farms before he returned to his own home. I, myself, visited a 

 farm where 70 such student farmers were working. They were not going to college 

 to be trained in the theories ; they were on this farm to learn how that farmer farmed 

 to make money. 



By Mr. Schaffner: 



Q. How big was the farm? 



A. That farmer kept 2'50 dairy cows. He also grew a large quantity of sugar 

 beets. I think he had TOO acres in that farm. These young farmers were given 

 instruction in the theories once a week. The practice was not confined to large 

 farms. All over Denmark the best farmers of the locality could have their farms 

 approved and receive these young farmers who came under grants from the Royal 

 Agricultural Society. In general the conditions were that the student farmer must 

 work for three or six months or a year, and at the end of every period write a report 

 to the society upon what he had seen and done and learned. In a few years the best 

 practice of the best farms became the common knowledge of the farmers of the whole 

 kingdom. 



By Mr. Thornton : 



Q. Has that system been considered very successful? 



A. Ye?. By means of it the best farms where the men were doing remarkably 

 well became known all over Denmark, and more than that their systems and methods 

 were adopted. Afterwards came the co-operative organizations for creameries, and 

 bacon curing establishments. These co-operative societies are for managing some 

 part pf the agricultural business of the locality and not for doing the farm work. 

 Every locality is practically doing for itself in detail what the Royal Agricultural 

 Society did for the Kingdom long ago. I visited several localities and learned how in- 

 timate and thorough were the mediums of exchange. The community spirit which 

 the Danes have in a very large measure — more than we have as yet, perhaps because 

 of the conditions of their national life in the past — ^has been applied to the problems 

 and difficulties of the farms; and so they have risen from poverty, from dire poverty 

 after the war with Germany, to being regarded as the most prosperous agricultural 

 people as a w^hole on the face of the earth today. I know localities in Canada where 

 farmers are doing better than in Denmark; I know such localities also in the United 

 States and in England and Scotland. The Danes excel in having levelled up in 

 general; we in Canada excel in the exceptions. Take one illustration. They send 

 large quantities of butter, bacon and eggs to the TTnited Kingdom. They get high 

 prices because of the superiority of the quality resulting from their methods of man- 

 aging. They take out of the United Kingdom annually over eight millions of dollars 

 more than other nations obtain for an equal quantity of the same products. They 



