77 



i$eientifi,v Agriculture. 



work t umed out witii these bulls is only a scraping of the surface. Suggestions 

 for using better ploughs were very often made to the cultivators, but then 

 excuse— and a good excuse it is— was that such ploughs would be too big for their 

 bulls. It is therefore essentially necessary that we should improve our live 

 stock ; and this cannot be done unless we grow substantial fodder for our 

 cattle. The pasture lands that we have now are liberally scorched up in the 

 dry weather, and our cattle may be seen to roam about the roadsides in search 

 of any bit of green thing that they can have a bite on. A fodder plant for 

 Jaffna is one of her chief agricultural wants, and if this want could be supplied 

 the breed of our cattle could be considerably improved and a further advance 

 could be made in agriculture. 



IMPROVEMENT OP THE EXISTING AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS, 



Though there are several products that are now grown in Jaffna, those 

 extensively cultivated are only three, viz., paddy, coconut and tobacco; nianioeca 

 may also be said to have risen to importance since some time back. Paddy is culti- 

 vated in the most primitive way, and there is ample room to improve the oper- 

 ations connected therewith. Turning of the soil or ploughing is done at present only 

 as a matter of time-honoured practise, and little or no attention is paid to the choice 

 of seed paddy. A good deal of the works connected with ploughing, sowing, har- 

 vesting and thrashing could be considerably simplified by mechanical labour, and no 

 attempt has yet been made to improve the existing methods in this direction. 

 Complaints have ve*y often been made of the decrease in the annual rainfall, but 

 the Jaffna culivator does not know what to do to suit the altered condition of nature. 

 Either a kind of paddy that would mature with a smaller quantity of rainfall must 

 be chosen for the seed, or some other measure should be adopted to make good the 

 deficient rainfall. These are subjects for the consideration of and enquiry by 

 enlightened and intelligent persons interested in agriculture and scientific researches. 



Tobacco.— Tobacco and coconuts are the only two items of Jaffna produce 

 that bring any foreign money into the peninsula. The former of these, viz., Tobacco 

 lias been grown and cured chiefly to suit the Indian market, but competition from 

 other places has considerably reduced the demand for Jaffna tobacco. 



This competition has greatly affected Jaffna, and it is highly essential that 

 other markets should be found for the Jaffna tobacco. The present mode of curing 

 the Jaffna leaves renders them quite unfit for European markets, and the varieties 

 now grown in Jaffna are not very much to the taste of foreign markets. The services 

 of an expert in the art of Tobacco growing and curing would be highly beneficial to 

 the Jaffna tobacco industry, and 1 hope that the local Agricultural Society will 

 take some interest in the matter. 



Maniocca Cultivation.— This cultivation has considerably increased, and 

 now holds a prominent position in the food supply of Jaffna. This is generally 

 characterised by the name of Panjeu-Thangi "or famine preventative," and it is 

 not an exaggeration to say that if not for the mauioeca roots, Jaffna would very 

 often have been a victim to the scarcity and famine that would otherwise have 

 followed the failure of our paddy crops on different occasions. 



The soil of Jaffna admirably suits the cultivation of this crop, and it 

 is a matter for serious consideration whether it would not be possible to extend 

 the cultivation to a still larger extent and export it to other places in the 

 shape of flour turned out of it. 



Extension of other Cultivations.— in addition to the above, we grow different 

 kinds of vegetables, roots, yams, chillies, grapes, mangoes, and various other crops 

 which would find a ready market in other places in Ceylon and elsewhere. Now that 



