A Four-year Plan for Agriculture
Speaking at Taunton on Saturday, the Minister of Agriculture dealt comprehensively with the recent past, the present and the future of the farming industry in this country. Farmers must now plan with their eyes both on the near future and the distant future. Foreseeing that food will be very short in Europe and the world for several years Mr. Hudson is thinking in terms of a four-year pro- duction plan beginning with the present year. The greatest shortages will be in respect of meat and fats, and therefore he is urging a change of emphasis from the production of crops for direct human consumption to an increase in live-stock and live-stock products. Above all, there will have to be more winter milk, arm more attention to live-stock breeding to increase the quantity and improve the quality of winter milk. We shall have to look in the future to a carefully balanced agriculture, and to ensure this the farmers must continue to receive all the sound guidance that can be given. They can at least look ahead with some confidence in regard to the next three or four years. But Mr. Hudson, without committing himself to prophecies about policy, looks beyond that, and expresses his confidence in the future of agriculture and its permanent place in the national economy. His tenure of his present office is becoming notable.
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