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Page Two THE CAROLINA UNION FARMER Agricultural Co-opera tion in Ireland. —Twenty Years of Agitation and What it Has Accomplished, By Clarence Poe of The “Of one fact we are rather proud,” said Mr. Robert A. Anderson, Secre tary of the Irish Agricultural Organi zation Society, as I was leaving him the other day, “and that is, it has been our good fortune in Ireland to set an example in agricultural co-op eration for all English-speaking peo ples.” This is exactly what Ireland has done; and our American farmer whose richer opportunities, better fa cilities, and more democratic atmos phere should have won for us a posi tion of leadership must go to Ireland to learn the lessons needed for all America and especially for our own Southern country. In Ireland, which has a population about twice that of one of our average Southern States, there are now 312 creameries with an annual turn-over of $10,000,000; 166 agricultural societies; 237 co operative banks, and 87 miscellaneous co-operative co-operative societies— poultry, bee-keeping, bacon-curing, etc. An Example for the South. Suppose we had in each county in the South two co-operative cream eries, one or two farmers co-operative societies for the sale of poultry and truck: such a development would cor respond to what has been accomplish ed in Ireland. Of course, all this has not been brought about in a day. The move ment started away back in 1889 when Mr. Horace Plunkett began to tell the Irish farmers that what they needed was less politics and more business—or at any rate, a good deal more business along with their poli tics. For a long time his voice was as that of one crying in the wilder ness. He held fifty meetings and pleaded with fifty different groups of farmers, asking each group to join in some co-operative business organiza tion, before a single enthusiastic re sponse varied the long monotony of deaf-eared failure. But Mr. Plunkett was an Irishman terribly in earnest; and anybody who is terribly in earn est is likely to go a long way—espe cially if he is an Irishman. “Beware when the Lord Almighty lets loose a thinker on the planet,” says Emerson, in words as nearly as I can recall them; and Mr. Plunkett was a thinker. He was also a patriot with a yearning for the uplift of his oppressed anl poverty-stricken home land. He had all the patriotism to which Erin’s poets and orators have given such vivid and eloquent expres Sion; but his patriotism was to take a form of constructive work rather than spectacular words. How the Credit System Bled Irish Agriculture. The Irish farmer, at that time, was the joint prey of landlords and “gom been-men,” the latter phrase being used to describe a class of credit merchants whose exorbitant time- prices kept the poor peasants in vir tual slavery. What profit the land lord did not get in the shape of rent, the “gombeen-man” got when the money for the farmers’ products came in. Or, to be exact, I should say that the credit merchant took the farmers’ goods at prices named by himself, and credited them on the farmer’s account, and about all the poor soil-tiller knew was that he was getting deeper and deeper into debt all the time. It was our blood-suck ing “credit system” of the South of a generation ago in an even more abominable form; and the “gombeen- Progt essive Farmer, men,” furnishing not only supplies, jut liquor as well, often took further advantage of the peasant after getting him full of drink. Saving the Middleman’s Profits. In a word, middlemen were absorb ing all the profits of the Irish farmer. Nothing was done directly. There was a circuitous route from the farm er’s produce to the city consumer, with tolls taken all along the way; and there was a circuitous route be tween the fertilizer-maker or imple ment-manufacturer and his farmer purchaser, with tolls taken all along the way. Alluding humorously to the fact that Sir Horace Plunkett’s an cestors were robber-barons. Miss Su san L. Mitchell says: “He was a man of direct meth ods inherited no doubt from these freebooting ancestors. He could see the farmer-producer and he could see the consumer; and he proposed in his simple way to hew a straight road out of the mountainous middleman that stood between them, so that the produce of the farmer should go straight from him to the con sumer and the money of the con sumer should drop straight into the farmer’s pocket without any intermediary toll being taken on the way.” Combination Necessary to Profitable Business. Another thing that Sir Horace saw (I say Sir Horace because the King of England has since knighted Mr. Plunkett in recogniton of his great services) was that if the farmers were to succeed, they must organize find co-operate. Only a eocslderable number of farmers working together could sell their products to advantage a small farmer cannot profitably ship a dozen or two eggs or a pound or two of butter or a basket or two of vegetables, whereas, it is very different if a hundred farmers to gether wish to ship their eggs, poul try, or truck—and they must work together along very business-like and scientific lines. He saw that the far mers were suffering not only because the middlemen’s tolls were excessive, but also bec^se their failure to unite prevented them from giving consum ers uniform, high-quality products. He declared they must furnish “one good kind of butter—not many sam ples of bad and good kinds; a uni formly fresh egg—mot a dozen stale ones of different shapes and slaes, with occasional fresh ones rubbing shells with their dingy neighbors”; and that they must furnish regular supplies at regular intervals—not three long weeks of famine and then a week of surfeit. A Threefold Program. “Better Farming, Better Business, Better Living,”—this was the three fold program which Sir Horace pro* posed for Ireland: more productive farming methods, better methods o buying and selling, and a richer rura‘ life. And he kept everlastingly at it. In season and out of season. After fifty meetings he got one society started in 1889, and 1890 ended with out another one being added to this lonesome one. But in 1891 the num ber jumped to seventeen; next year there were twenty-five; next year, thirty; next year, thirty-three; and then the day of small things was over. In 1895 the number of socie ties doubled; in 1896 the one hun dred mark was passed; in 1908, the two hundred mark — and now nhere are more than eight hun dred. The Irish Agricultural Organi zation Society—popularly know'n as the “I. A. O. S.”—is the head of the movement, with Sir Horace as the lead of the I. A. O. S., and Mr. Rob ert A. Anderson the Secretary. I was to have seen Sir Horace in Dublin, I may say by the way, but his absence in London makes it necessary for me to postpone my interview until I meet him there. Kilkenny—e Typical Irish County. Secretary Anderson and Mr. Nor man, however, gave me very full in formation about the various organ! zations at first hand. Kilkenny is a dairying county and ki it are sixteen co-operative creameries; four farm ers’ co-operative banks; eight agri cultural societies for the purchase of fertilizers, seeds, etc.; a co-operative poultry society and a farmers’ county :;air. In the depot at Ballyragget, the firat village I visited, the most con spicuous objects were cases with the abels, “Guaranteed Pure Irish Creamery Butter,” and other cases for shipment bearing the legend, “Guaranteed New-Laid Irish Eggs,” with the added name and trade-mark of the “Irish Federated Poultry So cieties,. Limited.” I made several trips out into the country around Ballyragget to see for myself the workings of the various co-operative societies, and I probably cannot give a better idea of the general move ment in Ireland than by describing in detail the work of these individual Kilkenny organizations as .1 saw them. A Co-operative Creamery. Perhaps the best work here, as in other parts of Ireland, is done by co-operative creameries. Mucka- lee Creamery, near Ballyragget, was one of the first organized after Sir Horace Plunkett began his work, and it has been such a success that I found the Castlecomer farmers plan ning to establish a creamery of their own if a sufficient number of cow's can be secured for it. Milk is tested for butter-fat, and farmers are paid by the pound—not by the gallon—and in proportion to the amount of but ter-fat in their milk. As a rule, the creamery butter pays the farmer six and eight cents a pound more than ordinary home-made butter, and the Irish housewife is also relieved of the work of churning and molding the product, besides getting back eight and one-half gallons of separated milk for every ten gallons supplied. A Ballyragget busines man told me that the Muckalee creamery butter was bringing 120 shillings per hun dredweight as compared with 96 shillings for ordinary farm butter; which statement being translated in to plain United States language (with the further understanding that this Irish hundredweight means 112 pounds, and not 100 pounds as with us) means that the creamery butter was selling for about 27 cens a paund and the ordinary butter for about 21 cents. Moreover, all the proffts of the creamery are divided among the farmers who supply the milk, so that the farmer has other sources of profit besides the gain from the improved quality of his product. The Co-operative Poultry Society. No less interesting than the Muck alee Creamery is the North Kilkenny Poultry Society, with headquarters in Ballyragget. This society, a com bination of 450 poultry-raisers In and around the village, has had a rather significant history. In the beginning, so a Killenny farmer told me, it had one or two so-called “expert” man agers from a distance who turned out to be “expert” mainly in eating up the profits, so that for the first three years the society ran at a loss. Then something happened w’hich often happens in these co-operative [Thursday, August 1, 1912- societies, and whenever farmers unite and meet together for any purpose^ hitherto unappreciated local was discovered and made use of. ^ members picked up John Carey, plain young farmer-boy without frills about him, but every-day conij mon-sense and a good character, put him at the head of the society. ^ three years’ time he has wiped on the old loss; increased the memDe ship by nearly tWo hundred and cairied the total poultry and egB trade from $25,000 three years ag to more than $40,000 last year. mers get 30 per cent more for eggs than they did before they ganized, not merely because they aa the middleman’s profits, but they ship eggs while they are fr® and clean instead of waiting for t ^ to get stale and dirty; ship ta® properly graded and crated, atiu cause they know where to ship la der to secure top-notch priees. A Society Wliich Tells Where to SiaP' This last clause calls for a word a parenthetical explanation. The va ous agricultural organizations ib tain in Dublin what is known as . I. A. W. S.”—the Irish Agriculta Wholesale Society—an organiza which not only furnishes the members with fertilizers and see wholesale prices, but keeps in with all the leading English mara and directs organized societies ^ to ship their produce. My friend- Carey, of the North Kilkenny try Society, for example, gets n j, from the Dublin I. A. W. S., say ( Saturday, as to what English he should ship his goods to lowing week, and the probable P The price is then fixed at whicb society will buy eggs during week, and all guaranteed fresh are bought at this figure pound. How the Eggs Are Collect®d'^^g The morning I was there, aS other week day, two carriaS®®^jjeiJ gone out over a radius of si^t ^j^gy to collect eggs; and on Monday^ nf the same size and color are go out as far as ten miles, the same size and color are ^jj.ppef together and small eggs are s as “seconds.” Dirty eggs ar®^^jjgii shipped separately, and care -uta' in every way to maintain a ^ tion for gl\(lng the buyer what is promised him. -d Another work it is now to take up is that of fattening^ jp- chickens before shipping to stead of shipping them el^eWi be fattened, as is the present o' dt' In this society, as in the the Muckalee and all other s g ganizations in Ireland, the ppnO to the patrons. There is nn gfO meeting which all the asked to attend, and the gj0ct® meanwhile is conducted by nn 0 committee of twenty-five quorum of whom meet With ^ ager monthly for the the books and for general o ^ 1 of the business. I was average patron had about n ^ jifK and the women, of course, m them in most cases. One other feature of yid deserves mention-—that it ® guP^^t have succeeded without .pf* y, it received from the Catho and a wealthy land-owner In fact, in nearly all the visited I found that the_ fathers—nearly everybody » jggd® p ny is a Catholic—were I wish our preachers in $ showed as much interests ^ ^gye* eral movements for riira ment and uplift. ill , r nn In next week’s article scribe and explain the of Ail successful and helpful sy cf jo mers’ co-operative bank gt ^ societies—something we work and get for the Son • Dublin, Ireland.
The Carolina Union Farmer (Charlotte, N.C.)
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Aug. 1, 1912, edition 1
2
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