Miscellaneous. 



392 



[Junk 1907. 



The advantages to be derived from such Associations are becomming more and more 

 widely recognised in the mofussil, and there can be no doubt that a central organi- 

 sation in Madras, to bring them into the closest possible touch with each other, as 

 also with every branch of the Agricultural Department, has already become a desi- 

 deratum. At the same time, one of the first duties of the Central Agricultural 

 Committee will be to stimulate the formation of such Association wherever they do 

 not exist at present, and it is hoped that ere many months are past there will not be 

 a District which has not followed the lead already given in Anantapur, Tanjore, 

 Vizagapatam, Guntur, Malabar, Chingleput, North Arcot and Bellary. 



CO-OPERATIVE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETIES. 

 The following account, taken from Mr Pratt's book, of the marvellous results 

 achieved by Co-operative Societies in France, Germany and Denmark, will be read 

 with interest :— 



During the latter part of the past century, most of the countries of Europe 

 suffered from severe agricultural depression which threatened to involve the agricul- 

 tural classes in complete ruin. Various econmic causes brought about this crisis, 

 but it is sufficient for our purpose to consider only the means adopted to overcome 

 it. Mr. Edwin A. Pratt furnishes us with some interesting information on the point 

 in his excellent work on " The Organisation of Agriculture." Various schemes were 

 tried by different countries, but the remedy that was finally adopted as the 

 most effective was the formation of agricultural co-operative societies by which the 

 agricultural classes were gradually freed from the clutches of the money-lenders 

 and were enabled to reduce the cost of production and sell their produce to advan- 

 tage. The following extracts from Mr. Pratt's book will show how these societies 

 have been organised in some of the countries of Europe and what benefits have 

 been derived from them :— 



France. 



In France, the movement began some time in the early eighties. The histo- 

 rian of the movement writes : ' ' Tne French market, which, by reason of the 

 development of the means of transport, was no longer protected by the natural 

 barrier of distance, began to be flooded with foreign commodities produced at a cost 

 that defied all competition. Our lands, exhausted by centuries of cultivation, had 

 no chance against the productions of virgin soils, or of countries more favourably 

 situated in regard to taxation, cost of labour, etc. The wheat of North America, 

 India, and Russia, the wool of Australia and La Plata, the wines of Spain and Italy, 

 and even the cattle of Italy, Germany, the Argentine Republic, etc., took, little by 

 little, on our markets the place of our home supplies, and the simple threat of their 

 being imported was sufficient to effect a lowering of prices. The national market 

 existed no longer, and on a market which had become universal, and was affected 

 by the slightest fluctuations that reverberated among the great centres of the world, 

 the French cultivator offered an easy prey to the speculations of international 

 commerce." 



These new economic conditions, which there was every reason to regard as 

 permanent, imposed on the agricultural industry a profound evolution. 



It was necessary to organise for the struggle, to realise promptly all the 

 possible opportunities for progress, to decrease the cost of production, and to 

 improve the methods alike of production and of sale. For the attainment of these 

 ends the old agricultural associations were but ill prepared. It no longer sufficed 

 merely to spread technical knowledge and to give prices and awards to agriculturists 

 at periodical exhibitions. 



