THE FUTURE OF AGRICULTURE.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume 3, Issue 733, 2 April 1881, Page 2

THE FUTURE OF AGRICULTURE.

1 have a few remarks to make upon the future of agriculture. Looking at it as a continuation of the Batne processes and methods which'ara now practised by farmers, it is gloomy enough. If it has to consist in growing straw to make into manure, and accumulating manure to make back into straw, in keeping stook with the view of'growing more corn, and corn with the view of keeping more stock. I am afraid we have seen the best of it, As long as landlords and land agents let their farms upon this principle, and as long as tenants follow it, we shall see no great revival in farming. The true future points in the direction of an enlightened tenantry exercising their vocation with freedom. We have a good climate and a grateful soil, but who ever commanded ua to employ it solely in the cultivation of about half-a-dozen crops ?. We must gradually break through this tradition, and be ready to grow crops which will continue to be profitable. Farming will tend to approximate towards market gardening, and the rage far large farms will be found to diminish as a larger capital is found necessary to stock an aore of land. Th? tendency may be gradual, but it nevertheless exists, and we must be ready to accommodate ourselves to the necessities of inevitable changes. We must consider closely the directions in which we are likely to meet with the most severe competition. Wheat, and corn in general, is not likely to fetch high prices any more. Beef is likely toiggiL to a lower range than heretofor JH mutton will to some extent with beef Milk, poultry, green turnips, and soft fruits v are on tjJH hand likely to maintain because of their bulk and wel^^l

proportion to their value. The the future must, then, be resource; he must be ready himself to new circumstances A adopt new crops when he finds undersold. He must look upon and the air as his agents for the of animal and vegetable forms, cise type of which must depend laws of supply and demand. If an mongei finds that he has a strong cfflH petitor in the sale of locks, he turns his ( attention to lamps, or to something els?, and so iriust the farmer,—Professor I Wrightsou in the chemical Agricultural Journal. 1 1