LEADING FEATURES OF THE WHEAT INDUSTRY 201 
experiments appropriate to the resources of the school, 
and calculated to bring out clearly the fundamental 
scientifie principles underlying the most important 
agricultural operations.’ Such a programme is now 
incorporated in our curriculum in the State schools, and 
our teachers are pursuing it in a highly commendable 
manner, which should once more turn the scales of public 
opinion in favour of agriculture. 
In the chain of causation to bring about an acceler- 
ation in the rate of growth of urban population to the 
disadvantage of rural population, an important factor 
is to be found in the increasing demand for labour in the 
towns for handling primary products and performing 
the official work. In our present organisation of market- 
ing, the labour involved im handling produce is of 
considerable extent, and moreover, not decreasing, while 
the official work in inspecting and grading primary 
products, as well as the expansion of postal, railway, 
and other transport services, requires an ever-increasing 
number of workers, many of whom have been drawn 
from the country. 
Rising partly from this increased demand for town 
labour is to be found another cause of no less importance, 
in that a higher rate of wages rules in the town as a 
result. Over long periods there is, undoubtedly, a steady 
tendency towards the equalization of town and country 
‘‘real’’ wages, but in the present stage of transition the 
town seems to offer a higher rate of remuneration for 
skilled labour. Of more importance in this connection, 
and exerting the same influence, are the opportunities 
for pleasure, recreation, social life, better education, etc., 
all tending to increase ‘‘real’’ wages in the town. There 
is reason to believe that the present tendency is for the 
wages of rural workers to improve at a greater rate than 
those of urban workers, though there is still a consider- 
able disparity. Labour conditions in the North, in the 
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