I am not addressing myself to this question in any narrow way. The problem which our people have to face in this warring and contentious world is not at all a simple one. What has impelled me to take this line is the fact that I have noticed that the Minister and his colleagues have started on a campaign through the country pressing for a better effort on the part of our farmers to give the nation more food.
I am sure the Minister and his colleagues are doing that with the very best intentions, and I hope that their efforts will meet with success. The problem of food supplies for this season and, indeed, for probably the next few years is going to be the nation's major problem. I have no doubt about that. Therefore, the contribution that any of us in this House or outside can make towards a simplification of it may be regarded as real patriotic work. I have no doubt at all about the supreme effort that our farmers have made to produce food during the last few years. What they have done has been really marvellous, that is measuring the conditions through which we are living as against those of our neighbours. We are at peace and our neighbours are at war. If we measure their compensation in terms of cash as against the compensation that our farmers have received, and measure their total incomes as against our farmers' total incomes, I really believe that half enough cannot be said in praise of our farmers and of their men for what they have achieved during the last few years.
One cannot think about the farmer and his men, and of the possibilities of our food stocks for the future, without thinking of the land and its potentialities. When I put a question on this to the Minister on a previous occasion I have a recollection of his saying either here or at a meeting somewhere that he had no fears for our soil fertility in so far as that is essential for full production. That is something which I am not able to follow. I do not agree with the Minister. I have great fears in that regard, and that is why I refer to the matter now. Last year one of the Minister's colleagues addressed a gathering of people in our county town on the question of increased production. Senator MacCabe will recollect it. Many present were probably supporters of the Minister. It was a gathering that, politically, one could not label very definitely. What those present wanted to talk about mainly was the problem confronting them, namely, the shortage of artificial manures.
When Ministers go to the various counties to talk about increased production, what they should think about are the difficulties that farmers are up against this year and will certainly be up against next year and the succeeding two or three years. Unless the situation that we are faced with to-day is altered considerably, our farmers are definitely up against a deterioration in the fertility of the soil, and to such an extent that we cannot measure what the possibilities in our total production may be from that cause. That, to my mind, is a very grave problem. A good deal of fresh land has been broken in the last five years. A great deal of land has been broken on which it is impossible to put farmyard manure. The truth, of course, is that our animal population is not such as to enable us to put into our soil the quantity of farmyard manure necessary to keep up our soil-fertility, taking into account the very great addition there has been to our tillage area.
I am at a certain disadvantage in discussing this motion, for reasons which the Minister will appreciate, in that I have not any recent figures of our imports of artificial fertilisers or of our exports of the commodities to which I make reference. I have figures for 1938 of the quantities of the various forms of artificial manures which we imported. Taking rock phosphate, slag and superphosphate, we apparently imported in 1938 the equivalent of 188,000 tons; and of the other forms of fertilisers—what we might call nitrogenous manures—we imported approximately 60,000 tons. I have not tried to calculate, at the rate of 6 cwt. to the acre, how many acres we could cover with that quantity, but obviously we have not anything like that quantity in these years. I hope the Minister will tell us what quantity we have, as that is something which should not be a secret.
The great fall in the importation of artificial fertilisers—which we utilised in days when our tillage area was much less than it is to-day—must mean that we have been extracting from the soil more than in 1938, without having anything like the quantity of fertilisers to put back into the land. There seems to be a very considerable drop in total fertility. Even in the case of very good land, when two or three crops of grain have been harvested, there is no prospect of a root crop. Even where we are trying to grow roots after grain and spread the available fertility over such an increased area, we cannot possibly keep up the supply and hope to extract heavy crops.
I imagine that there was a drop all round in total yields last year as against the year before. We have no means of measuring it, but I think, though we had a larger area under crops, the total yields of food were no greater than in the previous year. In my constituency, the total yield of potatoes and grain crops combined was certainly under that of the previous year, even though a greater area was tilled. The same thing probably is true of the area from North Dublin to Galway and across to Northern Ireland. I know that, in the Six Counties, conditions were much worse than with us, because of the unfavourable season.
Our potato crop was not much more than 50 per cent. of that in the previous year, and with many farmers it was not even 50 per cent. That was influenced considerably by the lack of artificial fertilisers. That consideration will be accentuated to a greater degree this season in the poorer lands all over the country, where there will not be as good a crop as in 1941. These factors are so important to the maintenance of our human and animal population, that the Department should take action at once. If they have taken any action so far, it does not appear to have borne any fruit.
This is not a matter in which the Government alone is concerned, because it affects the lives of our people in towns and cities. Those people took their food for granted in the past, and it was one of the things they were least bothered about. Food was there in abundance and it was merely a question of the money. Amusements, clothes, motor cars and the amenities of life were considerations of much greater importance. There is a complete reversal of that situation now. It is very interesting to hear some of the Dublin housewives relate their difficulties in getting things which they took for granted in the past. I fear their difficulties will continue for a long time.
The question of our bacon supplies for the future is still unsolved by the Minister or his Department, or by the Oireachtas. The situation is now much worse than it has been at any time. In the future it will be mainly a problem for the people in the towns and cities, as the people in the country will not be so short, but will manage to provide enough pig meat for themselves. The people in the towns and cities were accustomed to their nice lean rashers for breakfast in the morning, but we are now reaching a stage when a Bank of Ireland or even Bank of England note for £1 may not buy even a pound of rashers on the 1st September next. Indeed, I think there are places where it could hardly purchase that to-day. We cannot view this problem with unconcern, and should face it as a whole community and not—as in Party politics—as a group of people opposed to another group. In the past we exported cattle, sheep, pigs, butter and other fruits of our fields like beer and spirits; and in 1938 we brought back to the fields 188,000 tons of phosphates and 60,000 tons of nitrogenous manures of one kind or another. All that went back into the fields.
In 1938 we put back, in the form of nitrogenous manures and phosphates, some of the fertility our live stock and our crops took from the land, but the position is deteriorating. Every year since then we have been taking much more fertility from the land than we have been able to put back. That cannot go on except with disastrous consequences to the farmers and to the nation as a whole. We must face that position. We will have to live somehow after this war and, if we have nothing to live on except impoverished fields, that can yield only half the normal quantity of crops, I do not see how it will be possible for us to maintain a satisfactory standard of living for all our citizens. If we are going to continue the policy of shipping away from the land cattle and other agricultural products, and if we make no effort to get back in exchange manures for the purpose of fertilising our land, giving back to it at least some of what has been taken out of it, then our economic policy is absolutely crazy. Whatever action has to be taken to remedy the situation, I feel that this House ought to face it as a major problem, not only for this year but for many years to come. We must face the position with courage and unanimity.
I do not think it is the kind of problem that can be solved by such methods as we have so far adopted. I do not think that sending civil servants from here to deal with civil servants in England is the method by which the best results can come to us in a matter of this sort, because this is a matter of major concern. If we cannot appreciate that it is a fundamental consideration for the people, then we are not going to face up to it in the spirit which is so essential if we are to find a proper solution.
I do not agree with the type of mind —I do not know if it exists now to any extent—which believes that we ought not to ship anything out of this country, and that we should take as little as possible from other countries. I never accepted that view, and I do not know if there are many of these people still in existence. Anyhow, we have had our education and we know how far that type of policy is suited to this country. We realise now that life on this planet is not possible unless we can have between different countries such exchanges of goods and services as will make it possible for communities, closely associated from geographical and other points of view, to live comfortably.
I do not think any policy is good for this country that prevents its exchanging goods and services with other people with whom we can find satisfactory accommodation. I feel that the future is going to be bright for us only in so far as there can be an extension of that policy. I look on this position that we are confronted with to-day as being neither fair nor sensible for ourselves or Britain. I think it is clear that Britain, even to-day, is in need of food, and she will probably be in greater need of food six or nine months hence. I think the big problem of the world, and what may ultimately decide the war, is the food position. Men are, day after day, being drawn away from the fields everywhere on the earth's surface in order to get behind the guns and naturally the capacity of the earth to produce food for the people will diminish. It is all right to talk about women land workers, but if they have to plough up hill and down dale and cut corn with a scythe, the food production will fall off considerably in every land. It is essential that you have men to do the sowing and the reaping.
In so far as our relations with Britain are concerned I, like Senator Johnston, fail to understand Britain's point of view. They make it clear that they want food, but at the same time they will not give us the equipment, the means to produce food for them. Part of the material that our farmers require in order to produce food for many years to come will be an ample supply of artificial fertilisers. If Britain wants meat from us, the amount of meat which she can buy should be regulated by the quantities of fertilisers that she is able to supply to us so as to enable us to give back to our land some of the fertility that has been taken away. She did not supply us with any fertilisers last year and, up to the present at any rate, she does not seem prepared to supply us with any fertilisers for the coming season.
Britain can supply the answer to the question. She can measure our total production by what she is prepared to exchange for our cattle or whatever else she takes from our fields. I do not know what goods we are getting from England in exchange for the commodities we are sending to her. I do not know that we are sending anything across the Channel outside of the commodities I have referred to in my motion. I should like to know what commodities England is sending to us in exchange for our goods. One thing I do know is that we are getting only a trifling amount of what we need to put into the land compared with what has been taken out of it.
There are certain peculiar points in regard to our position. For instance, the Minister is engaged on a campaign for increased tillage. In my county and in other northern counties we grow a certain amount of flax. The production of flax is being encouraged. I am eager for the production of every kind of crop that our land can grow. I am for greater production and heavier yields of every kind. I am puzzled by this, however, that there is obviously a policy to encourage the production of flax. As evidence of that, it is possible for the producers of flax to procure quantities of artificial manures which are not made available to the growers of other crops. You can purchase potash if you are going to grow flax, but you cannot go to a merchant and say: "I am going to grow potatoes, oats, wheat or barley" and buy potash.
I cannot buy potash for my potatoes. If I am going to grow flax, which had to be exported, I can procure a certain limited quantity, and that is something which demands explanation. Last year, we had somewhere around 18,000 acres of flax, representing an increase of about 3,000 acres on the previous year.
I may say, in passing, that we are selling that flax to the people in Northern Ireland, who are paying our farmers a lower price for it than they are paying their own farmers in the Six Counties. So far as I know very little of what is manufactured from the flax is coming back into this country. I should like the Minister to tell us something about that. Anyway, it is quite clear that we are producing a crop which we cannot consume within the Twenty-Six Counties, and we are not obtaining, for the manufacture of linen or cotton goods, anything like a reasonable proportion of the yarns which would come from the total yield of this flax. What are we getting against it, and why is there evidence of a policy of encouraging its production, when nothing is coming back to the land, except the one-half cwt. of potash which men can procure against the growing of one acre?
When, at a particular point last year, we were apparently hard pressed in regard to wheat for bread, we had discussions about the exchange of barley for spirits against wheat. I do not know if we were told anything about that, and whether or not there was an exchange of one grain for another, or of the spirits manufactured from the grain for wheat. I do not know, but it is something on which the Minister can enlighten us. The major thing, however, is our cattle exports. There we have a very considerable quantity of food going out of this area—food which is very valuable indeed for Britain, and food which is not procurable by her anywhere else at present. It could be increased, and it might be considerably increased, by better farming methods here, and by a policy on the part of Britain which would enable our yields to be increased, or even to be maintained at the pre-war level, which it is not at present possible for us to do.
I feel that we have reached the stage now in relation to our farming policy when the Government, backed up by the people, will have to say to the British Government that the farmers of this country are being forced in these circumstances to take so much out of their land that, unless they can get in exchange for what they take out something which can be put back into it, the national position will be so worsened as to demand probably the complete overhaul of our present agricultural policy.
It will be argued that our cattle have to be sold—that the cattle are fat, that they are ripe and that ripe fruit must be plucked. That is true, but, if needs be, there is a way of preventing fruit from ripening. There are possibilities of altering our policy in various ways which may mean that not alone would our technique be altered, but our general lines of agriculture would have to be changed, because whatever else we cannot afford to do, the one thing we cannot do and live in this island is to rape the earth, as they have done on the American continent.
We have 12,000,000 acres of arable land, they say. I do not know how much of that is classified as first and second-class land. There is a great deal of it which is poorer than third-class land and a very considerable area must be second-class land. A great deal of that second-class land used to be cropped, and is being cropped at present. The yields were never very high, but they were maintained at a reasonable level, mainly by very hard work on the part of the farmer and by the application of phosphatic and nitrogenous manures which he procured in the past. That is the land which is going to become worthless in a very few years of this type of farming. The man with 50 or 60 acres, with a limited number of cattle, cannot possibly farm that area as it ought to be farmed. Our cattle stocks this year are apparently slightly below what they were last year, at the round figure of 4,000,000, so that we are not able to get any more for the soil than we got in the previous year.
In such a situation, the nation must take serious note of the position, and the Minister for Agriculture has, I feel, a very serious obligation put upon him. If he feels it incumbent on him to go down the country to gatherings of farmers to urge them to greater effort, the farmers everywhere expect that he and his colleagues will do something on behalf of the farmers for the soil and they have no evidence of its having been done yet. If I have a very serious job to do, I will not send my man into town to do it. I will do it myself. If I have a cow to sell or a cow to buy, I will do it myself. If the man comes with me, well and good, and at times I am glad to have his point of view, but this is the biggest thing which has to be done for the nation this year and its fruits are going to last into the years to come.
There is no question that members of the Government have negotiated with the British Government before, and if we were to measure the real value to the nation of what we bargained for then in terms of pounds, shillings and pence, that cash value would not be anything like the cash value of this loss, this devastation which is going on, if it could be measured in terms of pounds, shillings and pence. For that reason, this matter is something which, if it is to be tackled, should not be tackled by servants of the Minister, but by the Minister himself, or some members of the Government, and, if necessary, the head of the Government.
The Minister may tell us that they are getting certain quantities of artificial manures from the British Government. Those of us who live close to the Border believe that there is almost as much artificial manure surplus to the requirements of Northern Ireland as would give a very respectable dressing to the Twenty-Six Counties. That, at any rate, is the feeling we have, and I have no hesitation in saying that it ought to be possible to argue and debate this question with the British Government, and if it were argued with vigour, with strength and with conviction—and the cards are in our hands—from their total production of fertilisers it ought to be possible to get from Britain such an increased quota as would make all the difference to the farmers this year between profitable production and production which may mean a cash loss.
I do not feel that we ought to go over as beggars. I do not feel that we have to go as an inferior people, who have neither claims, rights nor status. As the Minister knows we have a claim on Britain to the extent of £300,000,000. I do not know what we are doing about that money to-day. They ought to be asked to honour more of our claims on it. It is also a fact that thousands of boys and girls have left this country in the last few years, and that no money could buy for Britain the services that these people are giving. I do not think it is for us to boast about that as it is a matter which the French in relation to the Germans are trying to side-step as far as they can. The truth is that our people in England are doing work that English men and women would not be able to do. If we send cattle to Britain we get cash back, but for the services of these young men and women apparently nothing is coming, except they of their free choice decide to send some of their earnings. Accordingly, we make a free grant of their services to England and, on top of that, the products of hard labour in our fields. Can we not make some claim on them for that? I am unhappy about this situation, that when farmers here produce goods which appear to be surplus, these goods are exported and that payment generally comes back, not in the kind of goods which our farmers require, but in a form that people in cities and towns require.
In other words, a good deal of the earnings are translated into consumers' products for the use of people in towns and cities. I feel that, when farmers send out quantities of goods, that represents a slice of our soil, because a beast cannot be raised without taking something out of the soil. We cannot grow flax, or grain to make beer or spirits, except at some cost to the soil. These products are going out and farmers see nothing coming here which they can put back into the land.
Some goods may come back but they become the property of people in the towns. Someone in the Government has to decide what goods are most essential. Somebody has to determine, as against artificial manures, what other things may be needed. It may be more important to bring in commodities that are required in cities and towns. The Minister can tell us what exactly we get in exchange for our exports. I suggest to the House that residents of towns and cities will have to make up their minds whether they are going to do without commodities, which are essential to human life, and which are the products of our fields, or do without other commodities which come from Britain, that are not essential to life but, apparently, in exchange for the goods that our farmers produce and export.
Our people will have to decide which commodities they must have. I do not believe that the present situation can continue. No matter how hard our farmers strive and no matter what additional numbers of men are employed, if fertility is not put into the land the yield of our crops will fall. I know that the Minister is an optimist about the fertility of our soil, but, if he was farming, he would see definite evidence of changed conditions. The Seanad discussed the milk question this evening. I have no doubt about the fall in milk yields, and not alone is there a shortage of milk in the City of Dublin, but in most parts of the country.
