MACHINERY IN AGRICULTURE
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.]
SIR,—In a recent article Sir Daniel Hall puts forward the contention that the adoption, on a widespread scale, of machinery in agriculture, must of necessity reduce the number of workers employed. I would suggest that this is a complete misconception of what is happening and what is likely to happen under a system of power farming.
From the nation's point of view, mechanical cultivation offers the very important advantage of enabling second and third class land to be kept in arable at times when it would otherwise be thrown down to grass. A thousand acres of moderate land so treated will often retain no more than a shepherd and his boy in employment. The same farm run by mechanical means for cereal growing will keep not less than four men in regular well-paid employ and provide harvest work for some additional hands. The matter need not rest there, however, for if in addition to growing cereals cheaply, the farmer elects to convert them into any form of animal produce, employment is at once found for many more workers.
It is the exception, where power farming methods are in force (apart from highly specialized cereal farms) to find any diminution in the total number of hands employed. The labour saved by mechanical aids is diverted by the enterprising farm manager into more productive channels, where the men can earn—in the true sense of the word—bigger returns for their work.—I am, Sir, &c., D. N. Meatany, N.D.A., A.I.A.E.
Engineering Dept., Harper Adams Agricultural College.
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