1 Jury, 1902.] QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. 53 
At the Warwick Conference, the late Minister for Agriculture, whilst deploring 
the fact that farmers seemed very unenthusiastic concerning practical co-operation, said 
he was “convinced that wherever people were well ediicated co-operation would be 
successful.” ‘This charge against the farmers of ignorance did not go beyond the 
reflection that they failed to inform themselves concerning those beneficial results 
which could only be attained through the medium of comprehensive co-operation —no 
union on narrow lines for the aggrandisement of a class or a district, but union. 
founded on a base as wide as this State, and designed to benefit every producer in it. 
While with some reason the saying that farmers are slow to move has passed 
almost into a truism, it would be somewhat unreasonable to expect the man on the land 
to enter into those business relations implied by active co-operative work with the 
same readiness as might his brother, whose daily avocations bring him in closer touch 
with general business than is possible for the ayriculturist, whose duties confine him 
and his family much more to themselves. Moreover, a farmer’s relations with any 
so-called business men not infrequently give him small desire to have any more 
dealings with them than he can help. 
This backwardness is by no means peculiar to this or any other country. Mr. 
Ernest H. Godfrey, secretary of the Central Chamber of Agriculture, in a letter to the 
Victorian Chamber, touches on this difficulty as encountered by his association, and 
the secretary to the Agricultural Organisation Society, in a letter to our Queensland 
Chamber, under date 7th January last, writes: “ Here in England as well as in Ireland 
and other countries we have to overcome an immense amount of innate suspicion that 
seems inherent in the farming class the wide world over. The farmers are always 
imagining you want to ‘have them,’ to use a slang term, They cannot believe that 
anyone will try to do them good from purely philanthropic motives.” 
Plunkett, in his memorandum on agricultural education for Ireland, has gripped 
one of the primary difficulties when he says, ‘‘ All educational reform is confronted 
with this adverse condition, that the supply has to precede the demand. <A full 
understanding of the value of education, and consequently a desire for it, is only given 
to those who have enjoyed its advantages.” It we substitute co-operation for 
education in the above we have our case in a nut-shell. 
Probably few in this room can remember any gathering of agriculturists at which 
the weakness of a farmer's position, due—in spite of the existing assoviations—to his 
comparative isolation, has not been under discussion. 
Practical attempts have been made in Queensland to secure a measure of 
co-operation amongst existing agricultural bodies. One of these, the union of the 
pastoralists, has been already referred to, The Department of Agriculture, through 
Conferences such as the one sitting to-day, has demonstrated from an educational 
stand point how comprehensive org misation secures wide mutual exchange of ideas, and 
promotes the extensive dissemination of knowledge. 
Our Pastoral and Industrial Association a dozen years ago, for a given object— 
the success of its annual show—invited representatives from various kindred societies 
to its council. 
At the Bundaberg Conference the Hon. Angus Gibson described the considerable 
success, not only for their own locality, but for the sugar industry throughout this 
State, whic had resulted from the organisation of some eight or ten district societies 
under the head of a Council of Agriculture sitting in Bundaberg. 
Forerunning the Bundaberg instance, the fruitgrowers of the Southern seaboard 
districts, some nine years ago, formed the Fruit and Economie Plant Growers’ 
Association in order to link together their common interests. 
his association was constituted with a council consisting of representatives chosen 
from an! by the various horticultural sucieties or analogous bodies already established 
in the districts mentioned, with an executive selected from such members of this 
council as were able to meet frequently together. 
Tn its own sphere this particular association has done work of a breadth quite 
beyond the power of any individual association or district, such as obtaining the 
appointment of a Government expert, assisting the Department of Agriculture to pass 
through Parliament the Pests in Plants Bill, and securing the holding of four 
intercolonial conferences and shows, the whole in the general interest of the fruit 
industry. ° | 
An organisation that would represent and be able to speak, when necessary, as with 
one voice for the various associations in this State, has long been recognised as most 
desirable of attainment in the interests of the general agriculturist, and very much 
has been written and said concerning the lines for adoption. 
Some have contended that no organisation of real valte to agriculturists could be 
secured, except in connection with, or working under, the direct auspices vf the 
