66

estimate of what this costs him. A summary of this information will be found in Appendix IV on page 697 We shall here cite some examples which will convey an indication of the variations which occur in practice. In the first place, it may be observed that, in asking the agricultural departments what it costs the average cultivator to feed his plough cattle, we set them a difficult task and their replies must be regarded more as an answer to the question "How would the average cultivator like to feed his plough cattle?" than to the question "How does he feed them and what is the cost?" In many instances, the shortage of bulky fodders, because of dry seasons or the small area of land available for growing cereals, and the insufficiency of concentrated feeding stuffs, because of lack of money to buy oil-cakes, etc., must prevent the average cultivator from giving his cattle the rations he would like to provide. Again to the question "What does it cost?" it is seldom possible to give a satisfactory answer, or at least an answer suitable for tabulation. In Appendix IV, the value of the foodstuffs used has been set out under two headings, "roughage and concentrates." It is not difficult to estimate the price to be attached to the concentrated foods used, for, whether grown or purchased, these have a readily ascertainable market value. It is otherwise with the roughage or bulky fodders. Near centres of population, such foodstuffs as the straw of wheat and rice, or the stalks (kadbi) of juar and bajra may be readily salable; but, in the majority of cases, these fodders can only be sold in small quantities, and the bulk must be used by feeding them to livestock. The value of the small percentage actually sold varies widely in different parts of the country. Thus, for example, in Burma, rice straw has been priced at the low figure of three annas per maund, whereas in the Central Provinces, a price of eight annas and in Madras of thirteen annas has been assigned to it. It will be evident that it is very difficult to arrive at the cost of such material as weed grasses collected in the fields by members of the cultivator's family, or of sugarcane tops which, if not consumed by cattle, would be burned. But while such considerations indicate that a wide margin of error must be allowed for in comparing the estimates of the cost to the cultivator of the roughage fed in different districts, it would be entirely erroneous to assume that, because a cultivator pays no money for such fodders, they are valueless. They have in every case what agriculturists term a "consuming value," and although, in Indian conditions, it is not an easy matter to assign to them a money value that will stand criticism, it is clear that the intrinsic value of the material must often be high. If, throughout India, there were (as there is in parts of Burma) a surplus of coarse fodders readily accessible to cultivators, it would be permissible to ignore the values attached to roughage, but this is far from being the case. The scarcity is such that, in many districts, there is great difficulty in bringing bullocks through the hot season in a condition fitting them for hard work in the monsoon. In most districts, the allowance of the better fodders available for cows is much too small; indeed it frequently happens that none of the stored fodders can be spared for cows. Wherever such conditions exist, the coarse fodders have a value which may be closely estimated when the cost of purchased

MO Y 286-13

oilcakes, etc., is known. For example, in the Gurgaon district of the Punjab, where a mixture of gram and oilcake is the usual concentrated food used, and where wheat and barley are common cereal crops, if a cultivator's stock of straw were no more than sufficient to carry his bullocks through the dry season, and the price of concentrated foods averaged Rs. 3-8 per maund, the value of straw to him would be approximately fourteen annas per maund.* The rate per maund charged in the estimate for this district is eight annas.

The total values placed upon the rations fed to a pair of bullocks during the year will be found in the last column of the Table in Appendix IV. The figures vary widely, but an examination of the details will show that this, in itself, need be no reason for distrusting them. The lowest cost, Rs. 15 per annum per pair of bullocks, is returned from the Sibsagar district of Assam. The cattle of this district are very small. They receive meagre rations of rice straw and rice bran while at work; but it is clear that they must find the greater part of their food for themselves in the jungle, or in fields where rice straw remains uncut after the ears of paddy have been harvested. Next in order of cheapness comes a Sind district in which cattle work for 2 months in the year only, and again find much of their food for themselves. Although kadbi is given them for about seven months, both the ration fed and the rate per maund allowed for the fodder are very low. Among the higher costs returned are Rs. 234 from Montgomery in the Punjab, Rs. 224 from a cotton tract in Madras and Rs. 211 from a wheat and cotton tract in the Central Provinces. If the very small cattle of Bengal and Assam and those in the parts of Burma where fodder is plentiful are excluded from consideration, it may be said that the cost of feeding the ordinary cultivator's cattle, as he himself would like to feed them, may range from about Rs. 100 to about Rs. 200 per pair per annum, according to the crops locally grown, and that, in most cases, the cost would lie between Rs. 125 and Rs. 175. If nothing is allowed for the value of the roughage grown or collected by the cultivator, and a price is attached only to concentrated foods such as grain and oilcakes, the outlay per pair of bullocks is estimated to range from nothing at all to about Rs. 110. A common figure would be Rs. 40 to Rs. 80 according to the work done. To the cost of feeding there must be added interest on purchase price and a figure for depreciation in value, which, in the case of a pair of young bullocks costing Rs. 200, would add to the cost of feeding a sum of not less than Rs. 25 per annum.

We have seen from the figures on page 181 that, for British India as a whole, there are 20 bullocks per 100 acres of the net sown area. This figure includes bullocks not employed in agriculture, but does not include he-buffaloes and bulls working on the land. We are, therefore, more likely to understate than to overstate the case, if we conclude that, for British India as a whole, a pair of bullocks suffices for the tillage of not more than ten acres of the land sown in any year ; and,

* Valued on starch-equivalent basis of 65: 16.

from the figures we have discussed above, it is obvious that the cost of bullock labour per acre must be very heavy.

In a question bearing so intimately on the economic position of the cultivator as the cost to him of his bullocks' labour, we recognise the objections that may be urged against resorting to estimates of cost; but, in the absence of figures giving the actual cost, no other course is open to us. We believe that the estimates we have given fairly represent the cost of keeping bullocks in reasonably good working condition and we are warranted in this belief by reference to actual costs as determined in one province.

Under the auspices of the Board of Economic Inquiry of the Punjab, Mr. H. R. Stewart, Professor of Agriculture, and Mr. S. K. Singh, Assistant Professor, at the Lyallpur College, have recently been engaged in determining the cost of feeding plough cattle in certain Punjab districts. To the actual cost of feeding, they have added twenty per cent of the value of the cattle for interest and depreciation. This rate, which is substantially larger than the rate we have assumed in our estimate, is based on the experience of the localities investigated. The results of the enquiries may be summarised as follows. In the Lyallpur district, on a holding of 111 acres worked by the owner with hired labour, thirteen bullocks were kept, and the cost of maintenance per pair worked out at Rs. 271 in one year, and at Rs. 283-3 in the next. The average cost per acre of bullock labour was Rs. 16-9. On a holding of 46 acres worked on a partnership (siri) system, four bullocks were kept; the cost of maintenance per pair came to Rs. 338 and the cost of bullock labour to Rs. 14-9. In this instance, the high cost of maintenance is largely attributable to the work demanded from the cattle; the usual area cultivated by a pair of bullocks in the Lyallpur district is from 12 to 16 acres, in this case it was 23. On a holding of 28 acres worked on the batai (half share of produce) system, four bullocks were kept; the cost per pair was Rs. 175, and per acre Rs. 12-8. On a larger property of 88 acres cultivated by three tenants (employing six pairs of bullocks) on the batai system, the cost of maintenance per pair varied from Rs. 188 to Rs. 240, and the average cost of bullock labour per acre was Rs. 14-5.

per acre

In the Montgomery district, where the cattle were of poorer quality than in Lyallpur and the feeding was inferior, the cost of maintaining a pair of bullocks on a holding of about 175 acres held by six tenants on the batai system varied from Rs. 86 to Rs. 145. The cost of bullock labour per acre ranged from Rs. 7-7 to Rs. 12-9, and averaged Rs. 9-6. These figures show how widely the cost of maintaining cattle may vary in two adjacent districts; and even as between the tenants on a single property. Similar investigations, so far as we are aware, have not been made in other parts of India; but the estimate we received from the farm at the Coimbatore Agricultural College must approximate closely to the actual cost of maintaining bullocks there. It may be noted, therefore, that at Coimbatore, where cattle are in regular work for from seven to eight months in the year, the cost of feeding comes to Rs. 260 per pair per

annum.

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BULLOCK LABOUR:

A HEAVY ITEM IN THE

173. In paragraph 164, we have pointed out the very heavy tax which the large number of cattle maintained per 100 acres of sown area imposes on the COST OF PRODUCTION. produce of the soil of the country. The angle from which we there approached the subject was that of the stockowner concerned to provide for his animals the necessary supply of fodder. We have here approached it from another point of view, that of the husbandman thinking of the profits that can be made from tillage, and concerned to keep down the costs of production. Whichever standpoint is adopted, whether it is desired that cattle should be adequately fed, or that the land should yield a better livelihood to the cultivator, the same conclusion emerges. India must endeavour to effect a reduction in the numbers and an increase in the efficiency of its plough cattle. 174. There is a third point of view from which this subject may be discussed, a point of view which should make special CESSIVE NUMBERS ON appeal to the people of this country; it is that of the welfare of the cow, than which there is no domestic animal more mismanaged. It has been necessary to refer at some length to the feeding of bullocks; but, unfortunately, it is not necessary to describe at any length the treatment of the cow. Broadly, it would be true to say that, if there is any fodder available after the draught cattle are fed, she gets it, or shares it with young stock; for the rest she is left to find food where she can. Where the cow provides some milk for the household, as well as for her calf, cultivators try to spare her two to three pounds of a mixture of cotton seed and bran, or oilcake, or pulse; but, when her milk fails, the ration is withdrawn, and she is turned adrift to find a living for herself on "grazings". To the quality of the "grazings we shall presently refer; but, before doing so, a reference to buffaloes is necessary.

INFLUENCE OF EX

TREATMENT OF COWS.

BUFFALOES.

175. The she-buffalo, rather than the cow, is the milk producing animal MANAGEMENT OF of India. Her milk is richer, containing as it does from two to three per cent more butter-fat than that of the ordinary cow, and, wherever there is a good market for milk and its products, it is the buffalo that is kept to supply it. Her treatment is very different in most localities from that of the cow. She is carefully tended by the women of the household, and not infrequently selection is exercised in her breeding. Little attention to buffalo breeding has so far been given by the newly appointed livestock officers; their efforts are mainly, and rightly, directed to the more pressing problem presented by ordinary cattle; but the cultivator himself, though he keeps no milk records, is well aware of the quantity of milk and ghi produced by the buffalo, and when specially good specimens exist in a village, there is, at least in some districts, a "waiting list " for the female calves that may be to spare. Moreover, in northern Gujarat-which, if any part of the country can claim to be a dairying district, is entitled to be so described-we understand that cultivators are most careful to mate their buffalo cows with selected bulls; and from what is known of the quality

of buffaloes in certain other tracts, it is likely that the same practice is followed.

The male buffalo, unless he is set aside for breeding in those districts where good buffaloes are appreciated, shares the fate, so far as management goes, of the ox tribe. Indeed, his position may be worse. No special sanctity attaches to the buffalo. When milk is of no special value, he may survive to take his chance on the common pasture, but we were informed by an expert witness familiar with northern Gujarat that the male calf of no special merit is allowed to die a natural (sic) death from starvation. The fate of the calf, in cases where there is a keen demand for milk, is a point that seems to have been overlooked by those who find in the development of dairy farming a prime solution for the problem presented by the improvement of cattle in India. 176. We have now reached a point at which the position of cattle THE OVERSTOCKING management may be summarised. The ordinary THE COMMON cultivator does what he can for his plough cattle and his she-buffaloes; quite often he does well for them, but bad seasons create difficulties for even the best cultivator, and the best of his cattle. The cow is less fortunate; she gets little stall feeding and has to seek the greater part of her food where she can; young cattle and the male offspring of her rival, the she-buffalo, share her fate and pick up their livelihood on common grazing ground, or by raiding crops, and who that knows these common grazings can blame the raiders! But this raiding of crops, which is an almost universal consequence of the mismanagement of cattle in India, is a very serious matter for the cultivator himself; it frequently presents to him the alternative of heavy losses, or of sleepless nights.

OF

GRAZING LAND.

We have already referred to grazing land, but, for a clear understanding of the position in respect of the common grazing land near villages, some further remarks are called for. We were informed in evidence that there is no shortage of grass in India. In a sense, this is true. But it is also true that, in existing conditions, this grass is of little use to the stock of the ordinary cultivator, for it is not accessible. Cattle can, and do, travel considerable distances in search of fodder; but the effort involved in walking calls for a corresponding increase in the amount they must consume in order to maintain their bodies. As a minimum supply of fodder must be secured, if not daily at least weekly, a point is soon reached when the energy expended in collection exceeds the energy which the fodder consumed is capable of yielding up to the animal's body. The greater the natural demand made on the body by the production of milk or the support of the growing foetus, the more difficult becomes the task of collecting within a day or a week the fodder that is essential to maintain existence. It is this difficulty that confronts stock owners in the more closely settled districts. In nearly every part of the country, the common grazing lands, and all grass lands close to villages, are hopelessly overstocked. This view was impressed upon us by many witnesses. Expressions such as every village overstocked with herds of wretched starving cattle," "deplorably poor cattle,"