1909.] Foreign and Colonial Office Reports. 499 



District of Odessa for 1908 {F.O. Reports, Annual Series, No. 4295) 

 contains a large amount of information as to various agricultural 

 matters, among which may be mentioned the following : — The harvest 

 of 1908 ; exports of cereals ; sale of agricultural machinery ; cultivation 

 of grass for seed; trial of machinery at an experimental farm; peasants' 

 credit associations ; the grain export trade of Nicolaieff and the credit 

 system ; cattle and sheep in the Don Territory ; and the fruit crop of 

 the Crimea. 



The Report on the Consular District of Moscow (F.O. Reports, 

 Annual Series, No. 4323), states that a noticeable feature of the year 

 was the large number of dairy farms started in districts which hitherto 

 had been purely grain or flax growing ones. The amount of land 

 under grass increased in some places by 50 per cent., and this increase 

 was almost entirely at the expense of flax fields. 



Where grain growing was the sole employment in many of the 

 northern provinces, formerly the exodus of the male population in 

 search of work was often up to 88 per cent, of the whole. With the 

 introduction of dairy farming, the movement fell in 1907 to 20 per cent., 

 and in 1908 to 15 per cent. 



Another hopeful symptom was the wider use of improved agricul- 

 tural machinery and the increased use of artificial manures, &c. The 

 transactions of the depots of agricultural machinery in the south, south- 

 eastern and Siberian districts show an increase of from 35 to 40 per 

 cent, in the year, mainly for reapers and sowers, in spite of the dearness 

 of iron. A considerably increased demand for artificial manures was 

 also noticeable, mainly on the part of peasant proprietors. 



Another very prominent feature was the decided tendency towards 

 co-operative organisation. This tendency was very marked in the 

 grain growing, dairy farming, cattle breeding, and similar industries, 

 and was entirely spontaneous. 



The activity of the zemstvos (county councils) during the year was 

 mainly directed to raising the technique of agriculture in its various 

 branches, and much was done in the collective buying of seed for 

 sowing, furnishing villages with modern improved agricultural 

 machinery, sending instructors into agricultural districts, improving 

 cattle breeding, &c. Many societies for the collective purchase of grain, 

 and of agricultural machinery, &c, were formed. 



Small Holdings in Poland. — Large areas of land were bought by 

 peasants in Poland during 1908, and a considerable number of 

 estates were turned into small holdings. Not only has land become 

 from 30 to 35 per cent, dearer in Poland, but there is a great 

 increase in the " panellation " of large estates, i.e., breaking them 

 up into small lots which are sold to the peasantry. Large land 

 owners are much more ready to sell their land in this way 

 than they were a few years ago. In their transactions with the 

 peasant buyers they are considerably aided by the Peasants' Bank, 

 by which the peasants are enabled to buy land without paying for it at 

 the time. These processes are bringing about great changes in Poland. 

 Peasant colonies are rapidly increasing, whereas the Polish farmer, 

 owning from 400 to 900 acres, is disappearing by degrees. Unfor- 

 tunately no statistics of the sale of land to peasants are to hand ; but 

 some idea may be gained of the way in which it has changed hands from 



