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The War and North American Agriculture
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 November 2014
Extract
War-time Agricultural Exports. The first world war and the present world war were preceded by periods marked by fundamentally opposite trends in international agricultural trade. The period extending roughly from about 1840 to the outbreak of war in 1914 was characterized by a continuous expansion in the volume and range of importation of foodstuffs and agricultural raw materials into the British Isles and later into industrialized continental Europe from overseas countries. While the dominant position in this expanding overseas agricultural export trade was held by the United States, a definitely rising participation developed after the turn of the century by the British Dominions, Latin American countries, British and Netherlands India, and the African possessions of European powers. Despite the rise after 1880 of agricultural protectionism in such European countries as France and Germany, growth of population and industrialization in Europe was reflected in a steadily increasing volume of agricultural imports into that continent, and after 1896 by a gradually rising trend in world prices of most agricultural staples. This was the great era of the international gold standard, of the free export of private capital, and of free world markets.
Although the first world war disrupted this competitive pattern of world agricultural specialization and trade, it greatly stimulated the agricultural export trade of overseas countries, especially of North America, to the allied countries, and this movement to Europe was substantially maintained during the twenties through the twofold influence of American and British foreign lending and investment and of the virtual disappearance of Russia as a significant and dependable agricultural exporter. Between 1925 and 1930 world agricultural trade rose to record levels, but in the later years mounting world stocks and gradually falling gold prices of most staples gave statistical warning of a developing disequilibrium.
- Type
- Research Article
- Information
- Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science/Revue canadienne de economiques et science politique , Volume 7 , Issue 3 , August 1941 , pp. 382 - 396
- Copyright
- Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association 1941
References
1 “Co-operators” are farmers participating by contract in Agricultural Conservation programmes, and complying with their farm acreage allotments for such basic commodities. Non-co-operating farmers are not eligible for C.C.C. loans except when marketing quotas are in effect, and then only at rates equivalent to 60 per cent of those applicable to co-operators.
2 While C.C.C. loans on wheat, corn, and cotton rest on a mandatory basis, the Corporation is authorized to make loans on or to purchase other farm products upon recommendation of the Secretary of Agriculture. During 1940-1 these operations have been applied mainly to flue-cured tobacco, barley, and rye.
3 This measure was not sought by the Agricultural Adjustment Administration but was passed by Congress under pressure of the American Farm Bureau Federation and other farm organizations. In signing the bill on May 26, however, the President stated that it “reflects the Government's objective for the last eight years, and the fact that the farmers did not have and have not as great a share of the national income as other groups.”
4 This proviso was doubtless determinative in the approval of the wheat marketing quota in the referendum of May 31 by more than an 80 per cent majority of those voting. Under this plan any wheat producer (with more than 15 acres in wheat) who sells or feeds wheat in excess of his quota, will be subject to a penalty oh each excess bushel of one-half the loan rate, or 49 cents.
5 The “parity-price” formula which has been the keynote of farm legislation in the United States since McNary-Haugen days, affords no recognition of the factor of technological progress in agriculture. The April 1941 Farm Economics Bulletin of Cornell University presents figures to show that the labour time required to produce a bushel of wheat in 1939 was only two-fifths of what it was in 1914-18, and that the monetary cost had been reduced by almost one-half.
6 A novel device designed to reduce cotton production and at the same time increase its consumption is to be found in the 1941 supplemental cotton programme. Under this plan growers who choose to reduce their cotton plantings below their 1941 acreage allotment receive cotton stamps at the rate of 10 cents a pound of the normal yield of the underplanted acreage. Through the Surplus Marketing Administration these stamps are redeemable in cotton goods. This programme is being accompanied by an intensified campaign to improve living standards through more gardens, food, and feed for home consumption.
7 See Hansen, Alvin H., “Hemisphere Solidarity” (Foreign Affairs, 10, 1940).Google Scholar
8 Foreign Agriculture (03, 1941, pp. 83–102).Google Scholar