Farming in War-Time
A Farmer in WhitehalL By Anthony Hurd. (Country Life. 5s.) MANY who farmed through the war, concerned with the ordinary and daily worries inseparable from their work and probably tired as the result of a spell of night duty with the Home Guard, will remember periods when a sense of annoyance and frustration at the seeming stupidities of red tape and control overcame them. Once a week Mr. Hurd or one of his colleagues would be "on the air" explaining Government policy or the problems which had to be overcome, and the farmer turned again to do as best he could, in better heart. In A Farmer In Whitehall Mr. Hurd tells the tale of how British agriculture was brought on to a war footing. He understates, in the best British tradition, the task set to the farmer and to those who led and cajoled him. One is given a glimpse of successive Ministers of Agriculture, of those civil servants, university professors, Members of Parliament and others who made the governmental machine work. Later there are descriptions of various schemes which were set on foot to increase food-productionvand to act as demonstrations, and finally a chapter on the future.
A German reading this book would wonder at the lack of planning and the casual way in which we met and overcame our difficulties. Democracies seldom hurry their preparations, though before war broke out Sir Reginald Dorman-Smith was able to introduce a few measures important in the event but puny when compared with the need. When Mr. Churchill came to power, Mr. Hudson and his team took over—and what a good team they were! He exhorted and improvised, applied the stick and hung out the carrot. Production from our land rose far above what had been thyught possible. Sailors, farmers and farm-workers between them fed the country till victory came.
"In war it is the unexpected that happens." It is our genius for improvisation, giving flexibility of action, which more than once has proved superior to the careful and rigid planning of our opponents. But our success in this case depended on the indi- viduals in the chain from the Minister right through to the farm- worker. Each link had needto be able to take the strain put on it. This book is a tribute to the links, forged at short notice and tempered by the will to endure which held the nation from starva- tion; to the Agricultural Executive Committee composed of farmers, for the most part, and others who carried through a difficult and often distasteful task, earning many kicks, no halfpence and few thanks. It records the efforts of the " landgirls " who left London offices to drive tractors or milk cows in surroundings utterly strange to them, and of the farm-workers who often clocked in their 80 hours a week so that the corn might be sown or harvested. As a tribute and a record of a great effort, the book succeeds. Like a sundial which only records the sunny hours, it misses out the inevi- table frictions and errors of judgement, the near catastrophes avoided at the last moment and the dilemmas where good judgement meant so much.
I cannot share Mr. Hurd's seeming complacency in his last chapter on the future of British agriculture. "During the election campaign of February, 1950, I met no criticism of the Agriculture Act of 1947," he writes. That may be; but the 1947 Act gave security equally to the moderate farmer and to the good one. Hundreds of young and capable men with a scientific training in agriculture wait today to rent farms, whilst far fewer than half our cattle are tuberculin tested. Prices negotiated, as they are, between the National Farmer's Union and the Ministry of Food, may be the only workable solution for the present ; but if this nation is to be fed largely on home-produced food, must we not find some better method whereby competition may be allowed to raise efficiency and reduce costs?
There is a school of thought which believes that it is for the good of our agriculture, and of the nation, for the industry to be removed or insulated from the hurly-burly of politics. Certainly Mr. Hurd's book makes this seem possible and desirable. I hold different views. But always there are many who take a delight in making the agricultural industry their cockshy. I commend this
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