942 



Women's Ixstiti'tes. 



[Jan., 



The Ministry has lately increased the educational Inspectorate 

 and has appointed a woman with high educational qualifications 

 and considerable experience of organisation. It is hoped that 

 this Inspector may be invited to visit Women's Institutes when 

 carrying out her other duties in the county and to consult with 

 the officers. This arrangement would probably prove helpful 

 both to the Women's Institutes, the Local Authority and the 

 Ministry. 



The Ministry has during the past few years devoted consider- 

 able attention to the preservation of fruit and the drying of 

 vegetables. A special Committee was set up for the purpose of 

 organising experimental work, and temporary premises were 

 acquired for the preliminary operations with the help of a gi'ant 

 fi'om the Development Fund. The results have, in the opinion 

 of the Ministry, justified a continuance of the work under more 

 suitable conditions, and a factory has been acquired at Chipping 

 Campden in Gloucestershire. 



The equipment of the factory is now nearing completion, and 

 it will shortly be in full working order. In addition to the experi- 

 mental work carried on there, provision is made for teaching by 

 a qualified staff. Short courses lasting for a fortnight will be 

 held during the summer and autumn, in which instruction will 

 be given in the best methods of preserving and bottling fruit 

 and vegetables, and a commercial course lasting for three months 

 will also be pro^^ided. 



Although Women's Institutes can do much to further agri- 

 cultural education and the work of the Ministry in the directions 

 above indicated, there is something more important still. The 

 War has affected English agi'iculture no less — probably much 

 more — than other great industries, and future success in any 

 branch of farming will demand a high degree of efficiency in 

 every class of worker engaged in it. To secure this success many 

 things are necessary, but there is none more important, none 

 which is likely to be more fruitful of results, than an earnest 

 belief among young men and women in rural England in the 

 value of knowledge and in the trained capacity to apply it to 

 agriculture. 



" Is truth ever barren? Shall we not be able thereby to pro- 

 duce worthy effects, and to endow the life of man with infinite 

 commodities? " If Women's Institutes will direct their 

 influence to encourage the growth of that spirit in the country- 

 side, they will add further distinction to the record of the fine^ 

 national work they have done already. 



