Live Stock 



516 



[December, 1911. 



of the Bulletin of Economic and Social 

 Intelligence, published by the Inter- 

 national Institute of Agriculture. 



First of all, we must observe that in 

 some German towns the problem was to 

 some extent solved by large establish- 

 ments like those of Bolle at Berlin and 

 Pfund Bros, at Dresden, whose large 

 trade, immediate contact with the pro- 

 ducers and scientific utilisation of waste 

 products, permit of their selling at 

 reasonable prices, while the very import- 

 ance and the name of the establish- 

 ments guarantee the purity and genu- 

 ineness of the article. In 1909, the Bolle 

 dairy alone sold 44 millions of litres of 

 milk at 22 pf. the litre for unseparated 

 milk, delivered at the dairy, and 24 pf. 

 if delivered at the customer's house, 

 that is 27 and 30 centimes respectively. 

 The work of the Pfund dairy is only a 

 little less important. 



But if large establishments are already 

 an appreciable gain, they tend too easily 

 to become monopolies. Therefore, the 

 co-operative organizations are of special 

 interest, as they take the place of the 

 middlemen, and in this way the profits 

 are reaped directly by the consumers in 

 the case of co-operative distributive 

 societies, and by the farmers in the case 

 of societies for production. 



While 40 years ago the producers were 

 quite isolated, the co-operative move- 

 ment has made such rapid progress 

 among them that in 1908 there were 

 almost three thousand co-operative 

 dairies in Germany, with about 260,000 

 members, which provide for the scientific 

 supervision, preparation and treatment 

 of the milk. 



Quite half of these local co-operative 

 societies already sell their milk directly, 

 but their action, to be efficacious, must 

 be integrated with that of the central 

 dairies which have sufficient means and 

 a large commercial organization. 



In this way there have arisen central 

 dairies in Berlin, Stuttgait, and flam- 

 burg and other German towns. If some 

 or these, and notably the two first, do 

 not answer all the hopes raised by them, 

 they yet exert a beneficent action in 

 regulating the market, and setting a 

 limit to the growth of monopolies, and 

 some have given really brilliant results. 



The most important of these associ- 

 ations as yet is that of Hamburg, which 

 includes 25 co-operative societies with 

 2,800 members, and can dispose of the 

 milk of quite 28,000 cows. Not without 

 struggle has it succeeded in getting its 

 strong position on the market by means 

 of a wise system of prices overcoming 

 the difficulties that opposed its progress, 



and becoming the chief supplier of the 

 Commercial co-operative societies and of 

 the whole city of Hamburg. 



In this way its annual sales have risen 

 from 49 millions of litres in 1901-1902 to 

 63 millions in 1909-10, while the unsold 

 milk, 13 millions of litres in the latter 

 woiking year was made into cheese and 

 other produce. The members of the 

 society are, for the most part, owners of 

 small or medium sized farms, who there- 

 fore directly profit by the economies 

 and improvements of the assooication. 

 It has been of appreciable benefit to 

 them not only in respect to the sales, 

 but also by means of assiduous technical 

 and sanitary supervision, it encourages 

 them to produce a better quality and, 

 at the same time, a larger quantity. 



(Summarised from the Bulletin of 

 Economic and Social Intelligence, No. 8, 

 Year 11, August 31st, 1911, published 

 by the International Institute of 

 Agriculture). 



SWEDEN. 



Development op Live Stock Insur- 

 ance in Sweden. 



In Sweden, Insurance of Livestock id 

 carried on by 46 societies extending their 

 operations over the whole country by 

 107 provincial and 552 cantonal or paro- 

 chial societies. 



The premiums paid yearly by the Swe- 

 dish farmers for livestock insurance 

 come to about 5 million francs, while the 

 value of the cattle insured may be estim- 

 ated at about 300 million f rs. From an 

 article on the subject in the August 

 Number of the Bulletin of Economic and 

 Social Intelligence, published by the 

 International Institute of Agriculture, 

 we l6arn that the largest number are 

 insured in the " Scandinavian Livestock 

 Insurance Society," with headquarters 

 at Stockholm. In 1908, the amount of 

 claims paid by this society was 1,636,184 

 f rs., almost half of the total amount paid 

 by all Swedish Livestock Societies. 



In contrast with what is observed in 

 several other countries, as, for example, 

 France and Italy, where local mutual 

 societies are most prominent, in Sweden 

 it is the National Insurance Societies 

 whose sphere of action is the whole King- 

 dom that insure the greater number of 

 livestock. Suffice it to say that they 

 insure 72 % of the horned cattle. 



Two causes have specially contributed 

 to the development of the large societies; 

 the frequent fluctuations of mortality 

 risks, the more dangerous for an insur- 

 ance society in proportion as its sphere 



