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THE FUTURE OF THE FAMILY FARM DAvro L. MAcFARLANE I N its economic setting the family farm is the last bulwark of the small independent entrepreneur, the man who combines the roles of the capitalist, the manager, and the laboureT. In its political setting it represents a decentralization of power necessary to the safeguarding of liberty. In its social setting it provides a wholesome atmosphere for the development of individual initiative and responsibility, for a healthlul life, and a well-balanced and rich social experience. This is the case made for the family farm as one of the most important, indeed almost sacred, institutions of our society. However, these claims, while possessing the substance of truth, are partially vitiated. In the first place, to the extent that farm pressure groups are active, there is no decentralization of political power. Secondly, the incomes produced on fulJy half of our Canadian farms are so low that the family members are ground down by poverty; in these circumstances a healthful, well-balanced social life and the development of i.tUtiative and responsibility cannot be achieved. Despite these limitations, the significance of the family farm as a stabilizing force in our economic, political, and social life cannot be stressed too greatly. In fact, there is a growing concern lest it be displaced or give way to an aJternative organization of agriculture, less favourable to the social and political life of the nation. The fear is that the rapid pace of tcchnologicaJ advance in agriculture will make cconomicaJly feasible onJy large units-so large that they wm no longer be identified with the management and labour of the single family. The influence of such changes in the organization of our farm industry would certainly not be lim.ited to the rural or agriculturaJ segment of our economy. The family farm has a direct and important bearing on our urban life because of the large :flow of migration from farm to city. The rate of this flow has apparently exceeded an average of 50,000 persons a year in the past two decades. Furthermore , this migration is almost limited to young people of eighteen to tlUrty, those just reaching their most productive age. The reasons for this persistent trend in migntion are (I) the higher birth rate in rural areas, and (2) the declining relative importance of agricuJture in om total society. (In 1900 some 45 per cent of the Canadian population was classed as rural farm; the proportion is now less than 25 per cent.) And this migration from farm to city is important in 200 UNIVE.RslrY OP ToRONTO QuARTERLY, vol. XX, no. 2, Jan., 1951 THE FUTURE OF THE FAMILY FARM 201 more than quantitative terms. Every study of the origins of those who occupy important places in the professions, in industry, and in commercial liie turns up a strikingly large proportion of men who started life on the farm. A recent American study concluded that over threefourths of all "leaders" in the arts and sciences, in the professions, and ill commerce and industry come from rural backgrounds. This fincling is probably equally applicable to Canada. Meanwhile, farming has been more and more mechanized. The farm industry has had to digest or assimilate into its system, not without great pains, a doubling of the number of tractors in less than a decade, a marked increase in the efficiency and adaptability of this machine, and the development of a whole complement of special tractor implements. That most arduous of all farm tasks, hay making, has now been put on a mechanical basis. However, these changes represent only one side of the technological revolution. On the other are the biological or non-mechanical advances. Such striking innovations as hybrid c.orn, rust and sawfly re,sjstant wheat, artificial insemination , and a whole range of powerful weed killers and bug killers date back but few years. The impact of these developments is be.st summarized in the doubling of labour productivity in agriculture in the past generation. The most remarkable fact is that the industry has gone through changes of this magnitude with relatively little evidence of a change in its basic structure. The family farm...

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