M.— AGRICULTURE. 



211 



fruit was all but unused as a food. To-day one district alone, the Lea 

 Valley, produces 30,000 tons per annum. The total production in 

 this country amounts to upwards of 45,000 tons. Yet the demand for 

 tomatos has increased so rapidly — the appetite growing by what it 

 feeds upon — that the imports in 1913 from the Channel Islands, 

 Holland, France, Portugal, Spain, Canary Islands, and Italy amounted 

 to nearly double the home crop, viz. 80,000 tons, making the total 

 annual consumption not less than IJ tons or about 2 pounds per week 

 per head of population. Is it too fanciful to discei'n in this rapidly 

 growing increase in the consumption of such accessory foodstuffs as jam 

 and tomatos, not merely an indication of a general rise in the standard 

 of living and a desire on the part of the community as a whole to share 

 in the luxuries of the rich, but also a sign that in a practical, instinctive, 

 unconscious way the public has discovered simultaneously with the 

 physiologists that a monotonous diet means malnutrition, and that even 

 in a- dietetic sense man cannot live by bread alone? As lending support 

 to this fancy and as indicating that the value of vitamines was dis- 

 covered by people before vitamines were discovered by physiologists, 

 I may mention the curious fact that the general public has always shown 

 a wise greediness for an accessory food which, though relatively poor 

 in calories is rich in vitamines — namely the onion. Even in pre-war 

 times the annual value of imported onions amounted to well over one 

 million pounds sterling; and, when the poverty of the winter diet of 

 the people of England and Wales is considered, it must be admitted 

 that this expenditure represented a sound investment on the part of 

 the British public. It is a curious fact also that the genius of Nelson 

 led him to a like conclusion. He took care, during the long years when 

 his blockading fleet kept the seas, to provide his sailors with plenty of 

 exercise and onions. 



If, as I think, the increasing consumption of the accessory foods 

 which intensive cultivation provides represents not merely a craving 

 for luxuries, but an instinctive demand for the so-called accessory food 

 bodies which are essential to health, then it may be expected that, as 

 has been illustrated in the case of jam and tomatos, consumption will 

 continue to increase. If this be so, the demand both for fresh fruit 

 and also for ' primeurs ' — early vegetables — should grow and should 

 be supplied at least in part by the intensive cultivators of this country. 



If the home producer can place his wares on the market at a price 

 that can compete with imported produce — and it is not improbable that 

 he will be able to do so — ^he need not, even with increased production, 

 apprehend more loss from lack of demand than he has had to face in 

 the past. Seasonal and other occasional gluts he must, of course, 

 expect. 



Even when judged by pre-war values, his market, as indicated by 

 imports, is a capacious one. Thus in 1913 the imports into the United 

 Kingdom of soil produces from smallholdings were of the value of 

 about 50 million pounds sterling. To-day it is safe to compute them 

 at over 100 millions. To that sum — of 50 millions — imported vegetables 

 contributed 5^ million pounds sterling, apples 2^ millions, other fruits 

 nearly 3 millions, eggs and poultry over 10 millions, rabbits and rabbit- 



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