FRENCH AGRARIAN POLICY

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LI, Issue 257, 23 October 1908, Page 4

FRENCH AGRARIAN POLICY

I "HALE AN ACRK AND A HOJIE- | STEAD." There is no country in the world where the land is s o subdivided as in France. Yet here, as elsewhere, says Renter's Paris correspondent, the large towns are constantly absorbing the rural population, and the now familiar phrase '•JiacK to tlie Land'' represents a problem which a few thoughtful politicians are making an earnest endeavour to solve. The latest experiment is less ambitious than the famous "Three Acres and a Cow " idea, of which so much was heard in England a couple of decades ago. It is a scheme which may be summed up as "Half an Acre and a Homestead.' Parliament sanctioned it in April last, but as the bill passed through without discussion nothing was heard of it at the time. The plan is now beginning to come into operation. What ~SL Ribot and other promoters of the measure aimed at was to give working men i n the towns and labourers in the country an opportunity to acquire on easy terms a plot of land and a modest homestead, arguing that this ,would be a more practical kind of provision for the evening of life than any old age pension fund. It was. imlec], while the Old Age Pensions Bill was unI der discussion thai, as 51. Ribnl his been telling an interviewer, the idea occurred to him. Siune of his'constituents in the Pas de Calais had suggested that i they would rather invest their saving-. in this way, and he at once sought to secure them the option of setting aside their prospective pensions as part payment of the purchase-money require! to buy a plot of land and a homestead. The field or garden must not cost more than \C4B, ami its extent is limited for the present to twenty-live acres —a little over half an acre. The intending purchaser must possess 240ir ( t!> 12s). If not. he is helped by the State, and the moment he deposits the money he becomes proprietor of the holding. He must undertake that he or his children will cultivate it, and he must also insure his life. The Slat' does not ileal direct with the purc'.mser. but with an intermediary, au.l guarantee, company formed in each district. A capital of £4,000.0(10 has been set aside for loans at 1 per cent., and each local company must have a capital of CB.OOO, of which half is to be held in reserve.

Tl riginal idea was to provide town or country workers with a home when they had reached the age of fitly or sixty, but it will be seen that anyone ivho has saved one-lifth of the purchasemoney, less than tl". can at once become the possessor of "llair an Acre anil 11 Homestead."