160 
vegetables or planted up fruit trees. It was perfectly easy to do so, 
but it certainly required personal attention. The question of the 
general food supply of the country is of great importance not only 
to the Government but also to the planting community as large 
employers of labour, which is dependent for its food on imported 
supplies. Taking the staple food of the country, rice, approximately 
three times as much is imported into the Federated Malay States 
annually as is produced ; the figures are roughly 60 million gantangs 
imported, against 20 millions produced. The Government is doing 
a great deal to increase the food production by smallholders, 
particularly by the bringing under irrigation schemes areas suitable 
for the cultivation of padi. Experimental work now being carried 
out by the Agricultural Department promises to lead to considerable 
increases in yield from the areas at present under cultivation. These 
efforts, however, could not. be expected to produce immediate results 
and at the present time the difficulty was to maintain the area under 
padi at its present level ; the cultivation of rubber has made the 
smallholder so prosperous, that he is not anxious to undertake the 
more laborious and less profitable work of growing padi. Could 
not more be done on and by estates to increase the production 
of food-stuffs F In all other countries, he had worked in, where 
there was a resident labour force, on estates, the labourers 
grew most of their own food-stuffs. In the West Indies, for 
example, the negro labourer grows his own sweet potatoes and 
yams, so that some fisli and a little pork occasionally is all 
he needs to buy. In this country there is practically nothing of the 
sort done at all and the estate labourer is entirely dependent on 
imported food. As Mr. Spring has pointed out, there are many 
kinds of food that can be grown here and probably in course of time 
will be grown. It is, however, not a healthy state of affairs that an 
agricultural community should be content to go on depending on 
imported food to such an extent. He was hoping to-day to raise 
a'discnssion that would show whether something could not be done 
to improve matters on estates as regards food production, what the 
difficulties were and how they could be dealt with. It was 
regrettable that the small attendance would rob the discussion of 
much of its value. 
Mr. B. J. Eaton, Agricultural Chemist, said that the subject 
was as interesting as it was important to them all. But in view of 
the small attendance that morning he thought the question should 
be raised whether some means could not be adopted by which a 
greater interest could be aroused in the matter. He did not think 
that, in view of the extent of the many estates they had, there would 
be any very great difficulty in setting aside a small portion of land 
on each estate for growing at least a proportion of food required for 
the labour force on the estate. It was the planter who should take 
an interest in the matter, and it was through liinl that they could 
hope to interest others. He was aware that managers of estates 
