Home Produce and Foreign Imports in 1889. 2 !•'! 
The aggregate results for wheat in Great Britain in the year 
1889 were brought up altogether to 73,202,773 bushels, as com- 
pared with 71,939,647 bushels in the preceding year, the estimated 
average yield per acre in 1889 being 29 - 89 bushels, against 28-05 
bushels in 1888, showing an increase in the total production of 
1,263,126 bushels, or 1 76 per cent., and an increase in the yield pet- 
acre of l - 84 bushels, or 6-56 per cent. 
Among the root crops the rate of yield for potatoes in 1889 ex- 
ceeded the estimated ordinary average in Wales and Scotland, but 
was lower in England by 0 - 24 of a ton per acre, the result for the 
whole of Great Britain being, in 1889, 0 08 of a ton higher than the 
standard. The gross produce in 1889 amounted to 3,587,765 tons, 
against 3,059,124 tons in the previous year, when the area so planted 
was, however, 10,900 acres more. In a large number of districts 
they were reported as being a bulky crop and generally of excellent 
quality. Mention was made of yields of fully nine tons per acre 
having been grown even on inferior sand land, but which had been 
well manured. 
The Imports for the past three years of food and other products 
which come into competition with, or in other ways directly affect, 
British agriculture are set forth in Table II. (pp. 246 and 247). 
These figures will repay careful study. Generally speaking, the most 
notable fact is the great increase in the importations of meat, and 
especially of fresh beef and mutton, during the year 1889. Judging 
by the figures here given, the dead-meat trade is increasing by leaps 
and bounds, the quantity of fresh beef and mutton imported having 
been very nearly doubled in the course of three years. 
The number of cattle which were landed " on the hoof " showed 
a considerable increase in 1889, as compared with 1888 ; but there 
was a marked falling off in the number of sheep. Taking all kinds 
of meat, alive or slaughtered, fresh or salted, there was an increase 
of something like 70,000 tons in weight, and of nearly 6,000,000/. 
in value, in the imports of 1889, as compared with the previous 
year. The imports of grain are, of course, subject to fluctuations 
consequent upon the home yield of particular crops. The total 
quantity of " bread-stuffs " — that is, wheat and flour reckoned to- 
gether — imported showed very little change during the three years 
given in the table, though the quantity was somewhat less in 1889 
than in either 1887 or 1888. The imports of dairy produce and 
eggs still continue their steady progression of annual increase, 
though there is some hopefulness to be gathered from the fact that' 
the quantity of foreign cheese was slightly less in 1889 than in the 
previous year. The most encouraging token — f rom the point of view 
of the home producer — is, perhaps, to be found under the heading of 
fruit and vegetables, the distinct diminution of the imports of apples, 
" unenumerated " fruit, and potatoes being, it may be hoped, an 
indication that the home growers are at length commencing to 
make headway against their foreign rivals in the markets of the 
country. 
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