254 AGRICULTURAL DEPRESSION IN GERMANY. [Dec. 1896. 



As regards the sugar tax law, the details of which have been 

 explained in a previous number of the Journal,* a provisional 

 law was passed on the 9th of June 1895, maintaining the then 

 existing bounties up to the 31st of July 1897. Later on, as 

 the negotiations with Austria for the abolition of the bounties 

 had failed, the Imperial Government resolved to bring about a 

 complete reform of the taxation of sugar on the same lines as in 

 the case of spirits, with the object of maintaining the sugar 

 industry as subsidiary to agriculture. For this purpose an Act 

 was passed on May 27, 1896, which raised the bounties so as 

 to enable German sugar to compete in the general market ; 

 restricted over-production by limiting the output of the factories ; 

 and imposed a graduated tax on production which enabled the 

 smaller factories to hold their own. 



As a further measure of relief, the law of the 14th of April 



1894 substituted for the drawback on foreign grain re-exported 

 from Germany, the identity of which was proved, a system of 

 permits for the importation of an amount of grain equal to the 

 quantity exported. This legislation is said to have effected a 

 considerable increase in the exportation of cereals, and to have 

 caused the difference in price between home-grown and imported 

 grain in the eastern provinces to correspond to the amount of 

 the import duty. 



The duration of customs credit granted in mixed private 

 bonded warehouses for foreign grain has been reduced from six 

 or seven to three or four months. The total abolition of this 

 credit and of the bonded warehouses is under consideration. 



A number of minor measures and enactments in the interests 

 of agriculture have been introduced or are in contemplation. 



A Bill has been prepared regulating the sale of chemical 

 manures, feeding stuffs, and seeds. An amendment to the Poor 

 Law, passed on the 12th of March 1894, alters the conditions of 

 relief favourably to the rural communes. 



As regards the question of agricultural labour it is proposed 

 to regulate the labour agencies by means of a licensing system 

 with a view to prevent breaches of contract. 



In order to remedy the dearth of labour in the eastern 

 provinces the employment of foreign labour has been permitted 

 under certain restrictions. The foreign labourers come chiefly 

 from Eussian and Austrian Poland; their number in 1892 was 

 19,505, and in 1895 it was 27,249. 



In connexion with this question it may be observed that the 

 last census of the German Empire shows that while in 1882 over 

 19,200,000 persons, or 42-51 per cent., of the population were 

 engaged in agriculture and kindred pursuits, their number in 



1895 only amounted to about 18,500,000, or 35 74 per cent, of 

 the population. 



* Journal of the Board of Agriculture, Vol. II., No. 3, p. 300. 



