32 Agricultural Holdings in Germany. 



It may be noted that since 1882 the number of rented 

 holdings has increased by 12.2 per cent.; their area having 

 augmented by 3.5 per cent. There is a very slight decline 

 in the number of farms without any rented land, but an 

 increase in their area of 8.3 per cent,, so that, although 

 there is an increase in the proportion of rented holdings, 

 the percentage of the total area which is rented has 

 declined. 



A comparison of the size of holdings with the employ- 

 ment of the occupiers brings out clearly the unimportant 

 character, from the purely farming point of view, of the very 

 small holdings. Of the 1,852,205 holdings under an acre and 

 a quarter no less than 43 per cent, are in the ha,nds of per- 

 sons whose chief occupation is described in the census as " in- 

 dustry " (mostly dependents) ; while the number in the hands 

 of persons engaged in farming is 31 per cent., and of these just 

 four-fifths are dependents. That is to say, that only 6 per 

 cent, of the holdings under i J acres are occupied by bread- 

 winners whose main occupation is fa^rming. If a further 

 sub-division of these small areas is made, we find the 

 percentage of farmers to be still louder in the smallest 

 classes. 



The extremely minute sub-division of holdings given in 

 the German inquiry enables us to institute a comparison, 

 with a very close degree of approximation, between the 

 proportionate number of farms of various sizes in that empire 

 and those of Great Britain, which are recorded in the 

 " Returns as to the number and size of agricultural holdings " 

 issued by the Board of Agriculture in 1896.* Such a com- 

 parison will much more nearly represent the actual facts 

 than a similar comparison between this country and France, 

 since the area forming the unit, both here and in Germany, 

 is the cultivated, and not the total, area of the holding. 

 The very small areas of one acre and less in Great 

 Britain (of which there are 579,133) do not come into the 

 category of agricultural holdings classified according 

 to size; it is therefore necessar}^ to omit the 1,852,205 

 holdings under acres in German}', this being the 



" C.-S243. 



