and Magazine of the Ceylon Agricultural Society.— July, 1910, 81 



AGRICULTURE IN JAPAN. 



LESSONS FOR INDIA. 



Lectuke by Sir F. Nicholson. 



Kodaikanal, May 31.— Sir Frederick Nichol- 

 son delivered a most interesting and instructive 

 lecture yesterday morning in the American Mis- 

 sion Church, before the Industrial Missionary 

 Conference, of which Sir Fredorick is an hono- 

 rary member. Besides a large number of gentle- 

 men who are specially interested in industrial 

 work, there were a large number of ladies (ire- 

 sent, and all listened to the lecture with close 

 attention. 



The subject was " Lessons for India from the 

 Agricultural Work of Japan." The lessons and 

 hints gathered from the lecture will prove of 

 great value to all interested in the agricultural 

 development of India. 



Sir Frederick — began by calling attention to 

 the moral, intellectual and social advantages of 

 agriculture. Cultivating the land was the first 

 task of man. Labouring in the fields brings 

 health and wealth to the body, and strengthens 

 and elevates character. Agriculture is a more 

 potent educational factor, if properly taught, 

 than manual training. Foresight, self-help, and 

 co-operation are some of the great lessons learnt 

 from tilling the soil. Agricultural work is the 

 direct gift of God. From the standpoint of 

 intelligence, agriculture is of great educational 

 value, for teaching is necessary for cultivating 

 even an ordinary crop. The character and tex- 

 ture of the soil, the different kinds of manure 

 and how to make and me them, the best kinds 

 of seeds, the manner and method of tillage, the 

 diseases of crops and trees and how to treat 

 them, as well as how to harvest a crop and sell 

 the produce, must be carefully studied, 

 and such study will greatly broaden the 

 intellect. Not many years ago the peasants 

 in Japan were very ignorant, but today they 

 received an excellent training and cultivate 

 their lands intelligently. Agriculture, in 

 Japan, has attained a marvellously high level. 

 From the social side, agriculture presents un- 

 limited advantages in developing a fraternal 

 spirit and co- operation along many lines. Thus 

 the people are brought together, and help each 

 other in their labours. 



Some Parallels. 



Sir Frederick— next noted some parallels and 

 contrasts between the people of Japan and the 

 people of Madras. Here in Madras, the people 

 have an average of 7£ acres each, against 2J 

 acres each in Japan. Thus the people of Madras 

 hold three times as much land as the people in 

 Japan. Further, in Japan, the people have to 

 pay a much higher rate of taxes. 



Regarding the method of cultivation in Japan, 

 it is deep, sometimes 2 ft. deep and never less 

 than a foot. There, cultivation is nearly perfect. 

 Here, it is very imperfect, and the land is merely 

 scratched, not overturned, not well fertilised. 

 Rice lands in India are fairly well cultivated, 

 but it is the dry land that is greatly neglected. 

 In America there were, for many years, vast 

 tracts of land that yielded very poor crops, but, 

 today, as the result of now methods of cultiva- 



tion, thoso lands produced excellent crops. In 

 Japan the dry land is tilled from one to 2 ft. 

 deep and is now very fertile, but it was not fine 

 and fertile by nature. It was brought to this 

 state by manures and care. A number of autho- 

 rites were quoted to show that the soil of Japan 

 was of bad quality and was naturally barren and 

 sterile, but by fertilisation and labour had been 

 made very rich. 



In the Madras Presidency, over an acre per head 

 is under cultivation, whereas in Japan the ave- 

 rage is only a quarter of an acre for an indivi- 

 dual. In other words, an acre in Japan is made 

 to produce four times as much as in Madras. It 

 is true the rainfall is more favourable in Japan, 

 but rainfall is useless unless the land is properly 

 tilled, for unless the land is deeply tilled the rain 

 will not soak in and is wasted by evaporation. It 

 has been proved by experiments that a very 

 light rainfall suffices to produce good crops. On 

 the Government Saidapet farm, a crop of straw 

 in famine time had been raised with only a quar- 

 ter inch of rain, and a fairly good crop with 

 2 in. This was due to deep tillage and frequent 

 cultivation. In Madras, no second crop is raised 

 on unirrigated land ; in Japan two crops 

 are invariably raised. In Madras, this is possi- 

 ble. Cholam, for example, matures in three 

 months, with very little rainfall, Why should 

 the land remain uncultivated for the remaining 

 nine months ? 



Again, in Japan, there are no agricultural 

 cattle and no sheep or goats. There are only 

 three million cattle and horses in Japan, whereas 

 in Madras there are twenty million cattle, and 

 forty million cattle, sheep and goats. Yet in 

 Japan the land is well fertilised, but in India 

 it is not. The reason is that in India, the 

 manure is wasted or is burned, instead of being 

 put on the fields. 



In Madras, the ryot is deeply in debt and the 

 debt is destructive. In Japan, the peasant is 

 not out of debt, but the debt there is productive, 

 as it is in Prussia, where the rural debt is 

 R7, 50,00,00,000. Formerly, in Japan, the rate 

 of interest used to be 30 to 40 per cent. The 

 natural complement of the peasant is the money- 

 lender, who is ever ready to charge an exorbi- 

 tant and destructive rate of interest. But here 

 it is that Co-operative Credit Societies come in, 

 and help the ryot. Debt is useful if productive. 

 The Madras ryot is lacking in education and in 

 specific knowledge. Each ryot is isolated, and 

 there is very little co-operation in work. In 

 1870 this was the case in Japan also. There was 

 no special education, no credit and no co-opera- 

 tion. All developments along these lines in 

 Japan have been recent. 



Agricultural Improvement. 

 How Japan has grappled with the problem of 

 agricultural improvement and developed its sys- 

 tem of agricultural education was next con- 

 sidered. In Japan emphasis had been laid on 

 deep tillage. The ground is dug up from 1 to 2ft. 

 in depth, the ridge and furrow system is 

 adopted, and the crop of stubble is carefully 

 turned under. The surface is incessantly 

 tilled, as many as six and seven hoeings for 

 each crop being the rule. Further the soil is 

 constantly manured. No manure, no crop, is 



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