1922.] The Future of British Agriculture. 



This economic antagonism cuts across agricultural operations 

 at many points. A simple illustration is that of spring dress- 

 ings of artificials on the wheat crops. Three of these dressings 

 will considerably increase the yield of grain and of straw. It 

 is, therefore, the national interest that all three should be 

 applied. But the farmer has to consider the expense of the 

 dressings in relation to the price of his produce. He has to 

 decide whether they will cost more than the added yield is 

 worth, whether he will give none, or stop after the first or the 

 second. He acts accordingly. The nation asks for the maxi- 

 mum output; the farmer cannot produce more than he can 

 afford. 



But the most important example of this divergence of in- 

 terests is afforded by the conversion of arable land to grass. 

 When a farmer lays down his tillage to pasture, he relieves 

 himself from many anxieties. He lessens his pecuniary risks. 

 He makes himself more secure of a modest return on his 

 capital. He has not to work so hard or continuously. He pro- 

 duces the two commodities — fresh meat and milk — which are 

 least exposed to foreign competition. Above all, he reduces 

 his total labour bill per 100 acres, a more important matter to 

 him than individual rates of wages, by something between a 

 half and two-thirds. As a man of business, he is prudent: as 

 a farmer he is adapting himself to existing conditions. But 

 the nation suffers a two-fold loss. It suffers, firstly, from the 

 reduction of employment and its consequences — rural depopula- 

 tion, urban congestion, increased competition for employment 

 in towns, a lowered standard of national health and virility. 

 It suffers, secondly, from the reduced output of food. Our 

 grass-lands have been too much neglected : they can be and 

 ought to be improved. Sir Daniel Hall is lyrical on lime; 

 Professor Somerville puts his last shirt on basic slag. They are 

 both right. Mine is a different point. Suppose you could 

 eliminate from our poor pastures all the rush and bent and 

 birds-foot trefoil. Suppose you could replace them with plentv 

 of clover, rye-grass and doostail. Suppose you could raise 

 the quality of your Poverty Bottoms to that of those rare par- 

 cel^ of pasture which are justly classed as rich. Even then, 

 you would be unable to raise half the quantity of food, measured 

 in meat and milk, which could be produced from the same 

 acreage of average arable land. In 1870, agriculture fed with 

 home-grown food something like a third more people and em- 

 ployed a third more labour, than it did in 1 918. Why is its 



