SHOULD FARMERS KEEP BOOKS

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LI, Issue 139, 3 June 1908, Page 4

SHOULD FARMERS KEEP BOOKS

To us it appears that intelligent management of a farm, like that of any other taiiicss, demands that accounts should l)e kept in proper form. The keeping of proper hooks does not, directly increase profits, but scrve s to show what departments of business are profitahle and which produce a loss. Every farmer goe s through a mental form of book-keeping when, he decides that lie can afford to pay a certain sum for his ! land either a s purchase money or rent, and a similar process is gone through when lie buys sheep or cattle at prices which he regards as likely to yield a profit. Why should not this rough process be made an exact one, eo that a fanner could tell to a penny what lie made out of hi 3 sheep last rear or the year before, or the profit per acre from various crops? It is only when data of this sort are available that farming will he raised from its present rilatc of muddled management to a really busi-ness-like understanding. The Itungitikei Advocates regards book-keeping for farmers as the first stage towards belter cultivation and general ■management, because once the farmer Itcgins to gel an insight into his true financial position he will ask himself by what steps it can In; improved, and will naturally turn to scientific methods of agriculture to assist him in producing better results.