oreign
agricultural producers have long been alive to this necessity, for their
superior education enabled them to grasp the economic situation and even
to realise that the matter is not one of acute political controversy.

Here, then, was a definite practical problem to the solution of which
the promoters of the new movement could apply their principle of
co-operative effort. The more we studied the question the more apparent
it became that the enormous advantage which the Continental farmers had
over the Irish farmers, both in production and in distribution, was due
to superior organisation combined with better education. State-aid had
no doubt done a great deal abroad, but in every case it was manifest
that it had been preceded, or at least accompanied, by the organised
voluntary effort without which the interference of the Government with
the business of the people is simply demoralising.

Generally speaking, the task before us in Ireland was the adaptation to
the special circumstances of our country of methods successfully pursued
by communities similarly situated in foreign countries. We had to urge
upon farmers that combination was just as necessary to their economic
salvation as it was recognised to be by their own class, and by those
engaged in other industries, elsewhere. They must combine, so we urged
on them, for example, to buy their agricultural requirements at the
cheapest rate and of the best quality in order to produce more
efficiently and more economically; they must combine to avail themselves
of improved appliances beyond the reach of individual producers, whether
it be by the erection of creameries, for which there was urgent need, or
of cheese factories and jam factories which might come later; or in
ordinary farm operations, to secure the use of the latest agricultural
machinery and the most suitable pure-bred stock; they must combine--not
to abolish middle profits in distribution, whether those of the carrying
companies or those of the dealers in agricultural produce--but to keep
those profits within reasonable limits, and to collect in bulk and
regularise consignments so that they could be carried and marketed at a
moderate cost; they must combine, as we afterwards learned, for the
purpose of creating, by mutual support, the credit required to bring in
the fresh working capital which each new development of their industry
would demand and justify. In short, whenever and wherever the
individuals