848 



The Revival of Village Industries. 



[July, 



THE REVIVAL OF VILLAGE 

 INDUSTRIES: 



THE WORK OF THE RURAL INDUSTRIES INTELLIGENCE 



BUREAU. 



Major L. Shoeten Sack, O.B.E. 



The decline of rural non-agricultural industries as an impor- 

 tant factor in the economic life of this country dates from the 

 introduction of machinery. With the gradual supersession, of 

 handicraft by mechanical means of production, there began a 

 steady transfer of nearly every form of manufacture to the towns, 

 with a consequent withdrawal from the countryside to the urban 

 areas of the workers required to man the newly erected town 

 factories. 



The tendency continued unceasingly until the centralization in 

 towns of every form of factory and workshop came to be regarded 

 as the natural direction of all industrial development. The 

 countryside was considered as being suited only to agricultural 

 work, and the towns claimed control of all manufacturing- 

 industries, even of those where the element of handicraft con- 

 tinued to predominate over the partial mechanical processes. 



As a result of this policy, the break up of the hitherto 

 prosperous village industries was as inevitable as the steady 

 depopulation of the countryside. To-day, with isolated excep- 

 tions, the few rural industries which have survived are carrying 

 on a precarious and languishing existence. Too frequently they 

 are managed by enthusiastic but insufficiently experienced 

 amateurs ; often their policy is directed by local sentiment rather 

 than by business principles; usually they are out of touch with 

 the rapidly changing market conditions and are, therefore, 

 unable to face the keen competition of their urban competitors. 



The outcome of the social revolution consequent on the intro- 

 duction of machinery has, therefore, been (a) to depopulate the 

 countryside to such an extent that at present only 15 per cent, 

 of the working population are country dwellers, and (b) to make 

 the livelihood of even that proportion dependent almost solely 

 on agricultural work by withdrawing the stabilizing effect of a 

 successful non-agricultural industry suited to local conditions 

 and seasons. 



In most continental countries, the retention of profitably 

 worked village industries has been encouraged by carefully 

 planned schemes of Government action, having for their object 



