130 THE WORLD'S MEAT FUTURE 



CANADA. 



Canadian fanners are making sti'enuous efforts to augment 

 their meat supplies, the numbei' of cattle in 1917 being about 

 8,000,000, against 6,600,000 in 1916— an increase of 20 per cent. 

 Sheep also increased from 2,022,941 in 1916 to 2,369,358 in 1917. 

 The (xoverument is assisting the farmers in every way to 

 increase their live stock. 



The Hon. Martin Burrell (Minister of Agriculture), in a state- 

 ment issued recently, outlines a co-operative plan reached 

 between the department and the Canadian railways. The aim 

 of the scheme is to prevent depletion of Canadian breeding and 

 feeding stock, insure the feeding of live stock in Canada, and to 

 secure the return of feeding and breeding stock to the farms. 

 It comprises — 



A re-distribution policy, which will provide for the movement 

 of stock from areas where feed is light to areas where feed is 

 plentiful. 



Free freight policy in connection with the transportation of 

 breeding cattle and breeding sheep. 



Fifty per cent, rebate of the freight rate on car-load shipments 

 of feeding cattle from \A^innipeg to country points in the eastern 

 provinces. 



Free shipments of car-loads of breeding sheep and lambs from 

 Toronto and Montreal to the West. 



Just imagine a proposal such as this on the State-owned rail- 

 ways of Australia, where stud stock are more heavily freighted 

 than fat stock when being conveyed. The "democratic" popu- 

 lation of the big cities would raise a cry that the farmers were 

 being favoured at once, instead of having brains to understand 

 that the more the producer is assisted, the better it must be for 

 the consumer. 



The Government of New Brunswick (Canada), through its 

 department of agriculture, is giving publicity to a proposal 

 formulated under recent legislation by which it is hoped the 

 pastoralists of the Province will be encouraged to devote moi'e 

 attention to sheep than has been done in the i)ast. Briefly, the 

 Government's i)ro])osal is this: Through an arrangement made 

 Avith the chartered banks, assistance will be given where it is 

 needed to all farmers to buy sheep. The department of agri- 

 culture will not only arrange to buy sheep for the farmers, but 

 will also bny from the farmers any good breeding stock that 



