M.—AGRICULTURE. 251 
Thomas Cawthron” for the Cawthron Institute in New Zealand. To-day 
the need is not so much for new Institutions as for the strengthening of 
some of those already in existence. 
Agricultural science has now widened so much that it is co-extensive 
with the whole range of science, and this has necessitated considerable 
expansion of staffs and full interchange of ideas and knowledge between 
the workers. This has proceeded in two different directions. 
Within the Empire all agricultural experts are now in touch with the 
central clearing houses in Great Britain, the Imperial Agricultural Bureaux, 
whose function it is to search the world for information likely to be useful 
and then pass it on to the persons likely to want it. These bureaux were 
set up at the request of a conference called as the result of the address 
delivered from this chair in 1924. The system is working well. 
World organisation of scientific investigation is proceeding rapidly. 
It is done on the basis of subjects; its method is the holding of inter- 
national conferences of the technical and scientific experts who to-day 
control the machine that works the material part of our civilisation. 
+ Of the three factors involved in the agricultural situation—production, 
marketing and the scientific advisory and technical system—the last is by 
far the best organised. - 
Much has recently been done, however, in developing better and more 
efficient marketing by the Empire Marketing Board and the Ministry of 
_ Agriculture. Happily there is a good demand for high quality produce, 
for small young animals not too fat; as our civilisation advances the 
expectancy of human life increases, but that of the farm animals decreases. 
One difficulty is the elusive British housewife, for whom all this elaboration 
of effort is made. In the main she knows little about the food she buys, 
and, having glanced at the bewildering display, she usually chooses what- 
ever is cheapest or gives least trouble—not because she is idle, but because 
in these days it is impossible for her to get domestic help. So there is a 
great increase in consumption of tinned and preserved foods, of margarine 
and of imported chilled or frozen meat; the consumption of fresh food 
shows no increase per head of population, while that of preserved food 
does. One of the needs of the day is a definite experimental inquiry 
to find out whether the freshness of food, of which the British farmer 
has almost a monopoly, is or is not an advantage to the consumer. 
So far we have only the Scottish experiments which showed the superiority 
of fresh over pasteurised milk. 
Our greatest need, however, is a better organisation of agricultural 
production. A beginning has been made by the overseas farmers; the 
necessity for sending all produce through one or two ports has compelled 
them to work through large organisations for grading, transporting and 
selling the produce, with skilled representatives in this country. Dealing 
in hundreds or thousands of tons they reduce all costs and all wastage 
toaminimum. Gradually the British farmer is organising ; the difficulty 
is to do this without destroying his sturdy individuality, one of his greatest 
assets, the loss of which would irretrievably damage our country life. 
But greater organisation is possible and is highly desirable. 
11 Born in Camberwell 1833; died at Nelson, N.Z., 1915. 
