AGRICULTURAL ORGANIZATION. In most coun tries a growing realization of the weakness of the isolated farmer as a marketing unit and, again, of the dominance of industrial and commercial interests in modern legislation has prompted the formation of farmers' organizations, in order to secure more adequate consideration of the position and needs of agriculture. The conditions of food scarcity brought about by the World War stimulated this movement. (See AGRICULTURE.) Governments were obliged to deal collectively with the primary food producers, who on their side were forced into combinations to secure that the necessary regulations neither impeded production nor im posed an impossible burden on the farmers. Combinations for marketing are dealt with elsewhere (see AGRICULTURAL CO-OPERA TION) ; the organizations here to be considered aim at uniting the farming community in order to influence legislation.
Further, since it has become clear that the status of the food producer can with difficulty be determined within the nation itself, considerable effort has been given to the formation of international associations which might be able to secure common action in the interests of agriculture. It is recognized that as regards the great staple articles of food, wheat and the other cereals, meat and dairy products, a common world price tends to be set, determined by the incidence of the exportable sur pluses from the countries producing more than they consume, upon the chief open markets, e.g., Great Britain. For example, the United States produces a certain excess of wheat beyond its requirements, which has to be exported chiefly to Europe. The price the American farmer will receive will be forced down by competition to the price obtainable in Europe less freight and commission. This is, to take an analogy, the pressure generated by internal competition to sell, at which the safety-valve blows off. The coincidence of other surpluses upon the European market or weakness in purchasing power there tends to lower the price; conversely the growth of a new demand, as from China and Japan, will enhance the price.
The tendency of commerce is generally to bring the run of prices of agricultural products, the output of which fluctuates from causes beyond control, continually down to the level caused by a surplus anywhere, a level which is on the average undesirably close to or even below the cost of production. Hence a gen eral depression of the agricultural interest all over the world and an increasing tendency on the part of farmers to seek more remunerative occupation in industry or commerce. This is the justification for the attempts to create some international organi zation of farmers, however remote and impracticable common action may seem.
The National Farmers' Union was only founded in 1908 and grew comparatively slowly until 1917, when it became neces sary for agriculturists to have one organization to deal with the Government on behalf of the farmers engaged in the cam paign for the increase of food production. It is organized on a basis of county branches, each of which makes an allotted con tribution to the central body; only men actually engaged in farming are accepted as members. By 1927 the membership had reached 130,000, farming an area of some 12,500,00o acres. A similar Society exists in Scotland.
One of the most notable organizations in Europe from the point of view of the influence it has been able to exert is the Union Suisse des Paysans of which Dr. E. Laur is the director.
Its membership includes nearly all the farmers in Switzerland, though the only figure available, 402,000, is the sum of the mem bership of all the affiliated societies, and the same individual may be a member of several of these simultaneously. It enjoys a subscription income of upwards of Ioo,000 francs a year The oldest of the organizations in the United States is The Grange, or Patrons of Husbandry, which was founded in 1868 for educa tional and social purposes. Later it became active in political life and in organizing marketing agencies.
More recently the Federation of Farm Bureaus grew up among the Farm Bureaus which were initiated for educational purposes by the County Agricultural Agents. It is now a widespread and active organization, exercising considerable influence both as regards marketing and legislation.
To this end the Commission Internationale d'Agriculture, a body founded in 1891, of which the chief task was the organi zation of the successive International Congresses of Agriculture, has been reconstituted to consist of representatives of agricul tural associations (not exceeding six for each country) and of co-opted members of distinction in agriculture, which latter may take part in the discussions but not vote. While the Commission meets twice a year in Paris, the resolutions that are to be communicated to governments are reserved for discussion at a conference to be held every second year in connection with the International Congress of Agriculture, of which conference only the elected representatives of the associations are members.
On the formation of this Commission, which held its first meeting in Rome in 1927, various other proposals for the estab lishment of an international association of agriculturists, e.g., that initiated by Dr. Laur of Switzerland, were dropped. Eighty associations from 22 different countries including all the Euro pean States except Great Britain and Italy, have adhered, and the Commission has entered into relations with the League of Nations and the International Institute of Agriculture at Rome. The Commission may be regarded as possessing the best title to express the considered opinion of the agriculturists of the world, and it may be hoped that it will also be accepted as the Con ference of Associations working with the International Institute at Rome. (A. D. H.)