Europaische WirtschaftsGemeinschaft

BEING in Translation:
EUropean Economic Community

Von:
ReichsWirtschaftMinister u. President der Deutschen ReichsBank Funk;
Professor Dr. Jecht, Berlin; Professor Dr. Woermann, Halle;
Dr. Reithinger, Berlin; MinisterialDirektor Dr. Benning, Berlin;
Gesandter Dr. Clodius, Berlin, und GauWirtschaftsBerater Professor
Dr. Hunke, Berlin

Mit einer EinFuhrung von:
GauWirtschaftsBerater Professor Dr. Heinrich Hunke
President des Vereins Berliner Kaufleute und Industrieller

HerausGeGeben von dem
Verein Berliner Kaufleute        und der        Wirtschafts – HochSchule
Und Industrieller                                                                        Berlin

Published
BERLIN 1942
Second edition 1943
Haude & Spenesche VerlagsBuchHandlung Max Paschke

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To assist non Germans, reading the above, certain letters have been capitalised for convenience ONLY
Pamphlet #03

Europaische WirtschaftsGemeinschaft

BEING in Translation:
EUropean Economic Community

Von:
ReichsWirtschaftMinister u. President der Deutschen ReichsBank Funk;
Professor Dr. Jecht, Berlin; Professor Dr. Woermann, Halle;
Dr. Reithinger, Berlin; MinisterialDirektor Dr. Benning, Berlin;
Gesandter Dr. Clodius, Berlin, und GauWirtschaftsBerater Professor
Dr. Hunke, Berlin

Mit einer EinFuhrung von:
GauWirtschaftsBerater Professor Dr. Heinrich Hunke
President des Vereins Berliner Kaufleute und Industrieller

HerausGeGeben von dem
Verein Berliner Kaufleute        und der        Wirtschafts – HochSchule
Und Industrieller                                                                        Berlin

Published
BERLIN 1942
Second edition
1943
Haude & Spenesche VerlagsBuchHandlung Max Paschke

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To assist non Germans, reading the above, certain letters have been capitalised for convenience ONLY

Pamphlet #03
Being the THIRD of a series of Pamphlets being published on the internet at: www.SilentMajority.co.UK/EUroRealist/Germany1942
Greg Lance-Watkins, who has overseen this project for SilentMajority over the last few years would like to thank ALL those who have helped in tracking down the original full text in German, and the short term acquisition thereof, for photocopying., Also for the lengthy process of accurate translation and independent checking of the translation work.
The original copy is available for inspection at Glance Back Books in Chepstow.

The final pamphlet in the series will contain ALL the maps and relevant charts, together with a brief summary of the document.
The European Economic Community 

Mr. Funk, the Reich’s Economic Minister and President of the German Reichsbank

Professor Dr. Jecht, Berlin

Professor Dr. Woermann, Halle

Dr. Reithinger, Berlin, Ministerial Director

Dr. Beisiegel, Berlin

Secretary of State Königs, Berlin

Director Dr. Benning, Berlin

Ambassador Dr. Clodius, Berlin and Economics Committee Advisor

Professor Dr. Hunke, Berlin

With an introduction by

Economics Committee Advisor, Professor Dr. Heinrich Hunke, President of the Society of Berlin Industry and Commerce

Issued by

The Society of Berlin Industry and Commerce and the Berlin School of Economics

Second Revised Edition (Berlin 1943)

Haude and Spenersche Publishing House Max Paschke

Preface to the First and Second Edition

This text contains the lectures presented under the title “The European Economic Community” by the Society of Berlin Industry and Commerce at the start of 1942 in conjunction with the Economic Advisor to the Berlin Committee of the NSDAP and The Chamber of Trade and Industry.  The order of lectures was as follows:

•	Walter Funk, Reichs Economic Minister and President of the Reichsbank:
“The Economic Face of the New Europe”

•	Dr. Horst Jecht, Professor at The Berlin School of Economics:
“Developments towards the European Economic Community”

•	Dr. Emil Woermann, Professor at Halle University:  
“European Agriculture”

•	Dr. Anton Reithinger, Director of the Economics Department of I.G. Farbenindustrie A.G., Berlin: 
“The European Industrial Economy”

•	Dr. Philipp Beisiegel, Ministerial Director of the Reich’s Labour Ministry:
 “The Deployment of Labour in Europe”

•	Gustav Koenigs, Secretary of State, Berlin: 
“Questions About European Transport”

•	Dr. Bernhard Benning, Director of the Reich’s Credit Company, Berlin: 
“Questions About Europe’s Currency”

•	Dr. Carl Clodius, Ambassador of the Foreign Office:
 “European Trade and Economic Agreements’’

•	Professor Dr. Heinrich Hunke, Economic Committee Advisor of the NSDAP, President of Germany’s Economic Publicity Agency and the Berlin Society of Industry and Commerce: 
“The Basic Question: Europe - Geographical Concept or Political Fact?”

The lectures met with considerable interest and very strong agreement. On account of this, we feel we should make them available to a wider circle of people.
Berlin, September 1942

The Society of Berlin’s Trade and Industry - The President: Professor Dr. Heinrich Hunke, Advisor to the Economics Committee

The Berlin School of Economics - The Rector: Dr. Edwin Fels, Professor of Geography

	Index	Page	
Preface		  2	
Hunke	Introduction	  8	
	The Discussion So Far and its Results 	  8	
	Economic Practice	  9	
	Problems Related to Economic Community of Continental Europe             	 10	
PAMPHLET #01			
Funk	The Economic Face of the New Europe    	 15	
	Real and False Economic Freedom 	 15	
	Co-operation in Continental Europe	 18	
	Europe’s Resources and Completion 	 20	
	Directing of the Economy by the State and Work 
                     between the States of the Community	 22	
	The Movement of Payments between the States and European Currency Issues	 24	
	Securing the Area and Economy of Europe	 27 	
	The Will for Co-operation in the Economic Community               	 28	
PAMPHLET #02			
Jecht	Developments towards the European Economic Community 	 30	
	The European Economic Community and its Enlargement    	 30	
	The Problem of the European Economic Area in Late Antiquity and 
                                                                                            the Middle Ages	 31	
	Recent Changes to the Problem of the Area of Europe 	 33	
	The Formation of the Nations and Independent Economies  	 33	
	Overseas Expansion and its Consequences for Europe       	 34	
	The Release of England from the Continent and the Formation of the 
                                                                                  “Free Global Economy”	 35	
	Europe’s Economic New Order: The Present Task                             	 37	
	Collapse of the Previous World Economy	 38	
	Means and Objectives of the European Economic Community        	 39	
	Outlook                                                  	 41	
PAMPHLET #03			
Woermann	European Agriculture                           	 42	
	The Development of Agricultural Enterprises and 
                                             the Structure of  Europe’s Food Economy 	 42	
	The Formation of the Division of Labour in World Agriculture                  	 47	
	Production Increase in Germany and Italy                                       	 49	
	The Supply Situation under the Influence of Economic Restrictions and Change                                                                    	 50	
	Political Consequences for Production                                               	 52	
	Possibilities of Increasing Europe’s Food Production 	 53	
PAMPHLET #04			
Reithinger	The European Industrial Economy                                   	 59	
	The Development of Industry in the 19th Century                              	 59	
	Stages of Technical and Economic Development                             	 60	
	Socio-Political Effects                                                                       	 60 	
	The Loss of Europe’s Hegemony in the World War                        	 61	
	The Transition to State Direction and Planning                              	 62	
	New Europe and its Shared Features                                             	 64	
	Regional Differences in Europe                                            	 66	
	The Major Powers at War - A Comparison of their Capabilities                 	 68	
PAMPHLET #05			
Beisiegel	The Deployment of Labour in Europe                           	 71	
	Population Density, Number and Structure of the Employed  	 71	
	People - The Wealth of Europe                                                                       	 72	
	Worker Exchange on the Basis of Inter-State Agreements            	 75	
	Adaptation of the Organisation for Labour Deployment      	 78	
	Employer Action and Order Switching   	 79 	
PAMPHLET #06			
Koenigs	Questions about European Transport                               	 81	
	“Technical Unity” in the Railway System	 82	
	The Magna Carta of Europe’s Internal Riverboat Traffic	 84	
	Motorways’ Contribution to the European Transport Community	 87	
	Community Work in Shipping                                                             	 88	
	Joint Work in Air Traffic                                                                    	 89	
PAMPHLET #07			
Benning	Questions about Europe’s Currency                                   	 91	
	Currency’s Two Sides                                                                         	 91	
	The Internal Economic Situation of Europe’s Currencies  	 92	
	Managing Foreign Exchange and Bilateral Settlements   	 92	
	Development of Multi-Lateral Settlements                                           	 94	
	The Problem of the Clearing Balances                                              	 95	
	Adjustment of Europe’s Exchange Rates                                          	 96	
	Future Formation of the European Currency System    	 97	
	Europe’s Future Currency Relationship to the Currencies of Other Major Nations 	 99 	
	What about Gold?                              	100	
	The European Currency Bloc                                                              	101 	
PAMPHLET #08			
Clodius	European Trade and Economic Treaties                                  	102	
	The Period of the Old Trade Policy                                                        	102	
	German Economic and Trade Policy since 1933                                      	103	
	Changes to Trade Policy Caused by the War                                          	105	
	The Reversal of the Law of Supply and Demand                                   	106	
	The Question of Labour Deployment in Europe                                         	106	
	The Problem of Traffic                                                                             	106	
	Effects of the English Blockade on Europe                                               	106	
	Principles of European Co-operation                                                           	107	
	The European Regional Principle                                                                 	107	
	Europe’s Economic Independence                                                               	107	
	Europe and the Global Economy                                                                	108	
	Internal Preconditions of a European Economic Community                  	109	
	Ways to Achieve European Co-operation                                                     	111	
PAMPHLET #09			
Hunke	The Basic Question: Europe – Geographical Concept or Political Fact?      	113	
	New Learning and Thought                                                                            	113	
	Starting Point for European Task 	114	
	Three Eras                                                                                                        	114	
	The Character of the Global Economy                                                          	114	
	Political Weakness of Continental Europe due to the Idea of 
                                                                         English World Superiority      	116	
	Britain’s Dominant Theory about the Modern National Economy	117	
	The Foundation of the European Economic Community                                     	118	
	Categories within the European Economic Community                                              	119	
	Three Principles                                                                                               	119	
	A New Era                                                                                                        	121	
	Taking a Look Back to the Past and to the Future               	123	
PAMPHLET #11
	The Illustrations – Maps, Charts etc. Summary of the series and Comments
	Request for help locating further FACTS
		Including Reinhard Heydrich’s 1942 Reichs Plan for The Domination
of EUrope – published in Berlin in 1942 believed to have been November.
ALSO – details of the Berlin Conference of 1944 Titled ‘How Will Germany Dominate The 
Peace, When It Loses The War.’ & details of the massive amounts of cash moved 
out of Germany during the war to safeguard the future of German domination against the economic collapse of losing the Second World War against EUropean Union. AND connections with organisations like The Bilderbergers, Council for Foreign relations, Tri Lateral Commission and other arms of the New World Order.

Introduction - by Professor Dr. Heinrich Hunke, Economic Committee Adviser to the NSDAP, President of Germany’s Economic Publicity Agency

Around the end of 1939, most of Europe was either consciously or unconsciously under the influence of the economic concept of England.  Over recent years, however, it has been swept out of European countries, politically, militarily and economically.  Politically the three-power pact has given honour once again to the ancient figures of life, people and room.  It has also established a natural order and a neighbourly way of co-existing as the ideal of the new order.  The foundation of English economics, which is the basis of the balance of powers, has been militarily destroyed.  And economically, a change has come about following the political and military development, the shape of which is easy to describe, but whose final significance is very difficult to evaluate.  I can only repeat, that the changing order that is happening now has to be ranked as one of the greatest economic revolutions in history.  It signifies a reversion of the economy of Europe to a time before the English concept of building an overseas Europe, i.e. an awareness of one’s own country.

The Discussion so far and its Results

Discussions about questions relating to Europe started as the power of the NSADP grew.  At the Congress of Europe in Rome from 14th to 20th November 1932, Alfred Rosenberg developed, for the first time in front of an international forum, thoughts and ideas that have moved us since.  No one, who fights for a new economic order in Europe, can ignore these perceptions and conclusions.  The economic and political wheel was set in motion, when the NSDAP declared the militarisation of the German economy.  It is to the credit of the journal ‘Germany’s Economy’ that it first seized these questions in 1932, kept on bringing them up and stuck doggedly to those original perceptions.  The idea of German economic self- sufficiency in the new political sense and the German economic militarisation are synonymous with this journal.  Besides this, Daitz, the ambassador, has earned the special credit of being the first to have related German economic history to the present time.  Part II of his selected speeches and essays, which appeared in 1938 under the title ‘Germany and the European Economy’, summarizes his concepts formed between 1932 and 1938.  The Italian, Carlo Scarfoglio, delivered with his book ‘England and the Continental Mainland’, a decisive historical contribution to the consciousness of the European continent.  Meanwhile German and Italian economic policy drew the political consequences from the historical lessons that were learnt during the blockade and learnt again during the sanctions.  The speech made in Munich in 1939 by the leader of the Reich’s farmers, R. Walther Darre, at the 6th Great Lecture at the Commission of Economic Policy of the NSDAP, takes a special place in the discussion at that time.  Its theme was “The market order of the National-Socialist agricultural policy - setting the pace for a new foreign trade order.”

While our leader maintained the hope of reaching a peaceful agreement with England, the route for European economic unity remained problematic.  The end of 1939 was a decisive point and it was natural that the years 1940-1941 heralded the new economic and political order.  The writer, in particular, developed and extended in speech and writing the intellectual fund of the new economic policy, which has been translated into most languages, so that today everywhere the great constructive texts are known.  These contexts revolve around the following issues:

1.	Theory about the Reich and the European economy.

2.	The historic, cultural, and economic significance of the German economic order.

3.	The foundations of the future economic relationships between the states.

4.	The nature of the European economic community.

On 25th June 1940 the Reich’s Economic Minister, Funk, publicised in his official capacity his thoughts, which underlined the development so far and thus gave them state sanction.  In October, the journal ‘German Economy’ summarised for the first time the principles of European co-operation, the fundamental principles of German foreign trade, Germany’s export economy and ways and means of promoting export.  It did so in a popular review “About A New Europe”, providing an overview of the important problem of European economic fusion.  Around the end of 1940 the Berlin historian Fritz Rorig finally outlined in his book “Hanseatic Essence” the historical foundations of the greatest economic and political achievement by the Germans.

I am clear in my mind that total clarity is to be found in the principle questions: The necessity is recognised for a political order for the economic co-operation of the people.  The nature of the new order which is: awareness of tradition, using up one’s own economic resources, long term economic agreements and fair relations, is affirmed.  The economic inter-dependence is underlined by fate.  The economic unity of Europe is thus evident.

Economic Practice

Even practical economic life has increasingly allowed entry to new thoughts.  I am able to see the decisive steps in the start and realisation of the following points:

1.	In the increasing payment traffic through Berlin.

2.	In the exchange of experiences in various areas of economic life.   Thereto belong also the statements of ministers and business people, the calls made by special advisers and the collective tackling of important tasks relating to the economy.  Even the specialist is surprised, once he has taken the trouble to put together all the connections.  Today they are already legion.

3.	In the signing of long term economic agreements between the Reich and the other European states, which the public is aware of.  There can be no doubt that such agreements are those of the future.  

Of course, that cannot prevent unclear points and new problems from arising, which become evident at the time when the situation is reviewed.

Problems Related to the Economic Community of Continental Europe

These unclear points primarily relate to the concept of economic direction, the extent of solidarity and neighbourly attitude, the development of one’s own powers, the care to maintain the standard of living and the question of raw material purchase from foreign countries. It is natural that one or another issue will take priority of interest, depending on the set of conditions that prevail.  It should be attempted at this point to give a reply, albeit a summary one.

There can be no doubt that the concept of direction of the economy, or rather its leadership, is as novel as it is revolutionary.  Its classification is all the more important, as the fate and consequence of European co-operation depend principally on a new consistent form of economic understanding.  The Anglo-Saxon view of economics is dead: consequently, even the so-called ‘classical’ national economy is no longer classical, but it has survived.   So what it comes down to is that a new understanding arises to do with ideology and terminology, which represents a sound basis for agreement and co-operation.  Relating to this, one must point out the following in detail:

1.	Economic direction is not a momentary emergency solution, instead it forms the core of new theory and practice.  First of all, it takes the place of individual egotism and the automatic autonomy of the Anglo-Saxon precept.

2.	Economic direction is not identical to the tendencies of a centrally planned economy.  It does not seek to cancel the individual or to administer through the state operators.

3.	Economic direction really means the following: the new instruction of the creative and constructive power of the individual in relation to the whole system; the creation of a consistent economic view and an attitude towards the economy; the selection of important tasks through political leadership and the state’s final decision on all questions about economic power.  Beyond this, the economy is free and responsible to itself.  

The degree of solidarity of the individual economies and their neighbourly attitude is characterised by three guidelines: 

Firstly, it is limited in regard to its own economic development by the recognition that the utilisation of individual resources represents not only a requirement of the new economic precept, but is the very foundation for economic activity.  The European economic community has no interest in leaving any abilities or possibilities unutilised.  

Secondly, it contains the obligation that, because of Europe’s freedom, consideration is given firstly to continental Europe regarding any matter related to economic activity.  Not only should the shared fate of the European people be emphasized, but the fact should also be stressed that the supplementation of the European economies beyond their borders is possible and sought after.

Thirdly, it must be maintained that, above all else, the spirit of the individual economies may not be allowed to go against the spirit of neighbourly co-operation.

The question of developing one’s own powers refers to the problem of monocultures, of industrialisation of the agrarian south-east and the awakening of new needs.

An answer can easily be given to the first question.  Monocultures are the result of the same economic precept that made the world market price the determining factor in the economy.  According to that precept, people and land are the vestiges of some by-gone age.  Europe is well on the way to destroying these monocultures with initiatives ranging from land improvements and growing new crops to discovering new local resources.  All these have the same aim, which is to develop the economy and broaden its basis.  Germany and the whole of Europe can only greet these efforts with gratitude.

The industrialisation of the south-east poses a particular problem regarding these questions.  As I am unable to handle this problem - like all other problems - here in a comprehensive and exhaustive manner, because the industrialisation of economies is theoretically a difficult problem, I can only say as follows:

1.	Just as it is in the nature of things that each country will strive to utilise its available resources for its own production, so will there will be a knock-on effect for other economic partners.

2.	If, as is the case in the South-east European countries, there is heavy 
over-population in the countryside, then there are only three possibilities to solve it: itinerant workers, a permanent emigration and an ‘intensivisation’ of the local economy, a term correctly created by Dr. Ilgner for the problem of industrialisation.  Itinerant workers can only form a part solution.  Besides, it only applies to agricultural and construction workers and gone on for ages.  Permanent emigration from Europe is just as false as impossible.  There just remains the intensivisation of the economies of south-east Europe as the way to self-help.

3.   The economies should make it possible for an independent life according to the modern economic view.  The intensivisation of their economies therefore is right for the time.

4.   The old features of industrialisation, which evolved from the price collapses in countries with agriculture and raw materials, have to now belong to the past.  Europe is a communal living area.  Only through a joint development of economies - and not through independence from one another - can protection against crises be achieved.

5.    The tasks that have to be solved in Europe are so big that the powers needed to do so have to be released by an intensivisation of the individual economies.  This can be easily done by employing the workers that have been liberated in new branches of the economy.

Without affecting the difficult questions of purchasing power, it can be regarded as proven that the joint work to build up Germany’s and the south-eastern states’ in the area of industrialisation lies in the direction of the intensivation of interest of the whole continent.  

One important and until now completely overlooked task in this regard exists and that is the awakening of new needs in the south-eastern countries.  It is because, in those countries, wealth has grown and will gradually continue to grow, as a result of the reliable purchase of agricultural products and available raw materials at adequate price levels.  According to the principle in economics that giving equals taking, peoples’ living habits there will have to change, otherwise one day the process will come to a halt.  Germany’s ability to absorb the products from the south-east is practically infinite, whereas creating a demand for German goods there is not only a matter for economic intensivation but also one of modifying the people so they consume more.  This task is of such importance that it has to be considered from the very outset, so that the south-eastern European economies are elevated after the war.

Equally important as the industrialisation of south-east Europe is the question of the standard of living in the north.  Their economic development and high standard of living, which underpin their lives though all economic conditions, should not be mistaken.  This standard of living has grown considerably during the 19th century and around the time of the world war due to free trade, so that various circles view world economic events with particular concern.  From a German viewpoint, only the following points can be made:

Firstly, a higher standard of living is also the aim of the German government. The German people not only understand this well, but also through its fight wants to ensure European civilisation and culture.  This fight will benefit the whole of Europe, and with it the north.

Secondly, despite being connected successfully to England and its economic system (one should not ignore the countless economic troughs that feature there), the economies of the north whose fate and greatness are very closely linked to Germany.

Thirdly, the northern states’ difficulties are going through a temporary phase of adjustment.  In the long term, this will bring about a lasting advancement, rather than destruction, for their economies’ foundations.

Maintaining a high standard of living is not an insoluble problem.  To finish, I now come to the problem of purchasing raw materials from overseas markets.  A leading south-east European economist once wrote about this principal question: “Unlike the war, we were in the following situation: in order to import raw materials from overseas countries, we bought goods from west European countries with foreign exchange.  In the area of continental Europe there is no gold.  Everything had to pass through the system of clearing - goods sold against goods. We have no product that can be sold to North or South America.  That means that the leading nations are obliged to acquire and distribute to us the raw materials that we need.  The leading nations of Europe can supply, with its capacity, enough products to overseas countries with which to acquire raw materials.  The one question is whether exchange will ever happen… Even before the new order is introduced, and without even joining in with the Axis powers, we stand in solidarity outside Europe with its traffic of goods…”

We can only agree with this view, leaving the matter open, as the Reich’s Economic Minister Funk described, how large the direct sources of help will be and whether raw material acquisition from overseas will take place through the system of clearing or free flow of currency.  With the introduction of the multi-lateral clearing system, on a practical level there is no change from the pre-war time.  As this learned person said, “All the benefits of the method of paying are regained from the system of free currency.”  Nor can it be realised - contrary to him - that this system of clearing through Berlin should function without those countries outside the European system. But the decisive factor is the way in which the continent is bound to Germany and Italy by one fate.

Since 1940, therefore, we are faced with an unparalleled economic and political revolution.  The problems created for us are large but can be solved.  Their solution will give Europe the peace it yearns for and will bring a great era of joint development.  It is worth fighting and working for this. 

 The following discourses should contribute to helping us to broaden and deepen our understanding of the tasks and nature of the European economic community.

European Agriculture
by Dr. Emil Woermann, Professor at the University of Halle

Individual countries are increasingly becoming aware that the efforts by Germany and Italy to achieve self-sufficiency in essential foodstuffs will have to be extended across much of the European area.  The questions being asked how to achieve this aim are many and varied.  It is therefore my task to shine some light on the European food problem through the last decades and to describe the present and future duties and developmental possibilities in broad outline.  It is not possible here, though, to expand on the extent of this multifaceted problem and to go into technical details.  We will instead look at the matter as a whole and try to point out the individual processes and measures in relation to the whole question.

The Development of Agricultural Enterprises and the Structure of Europe’s Food Economy

The situation at the outbreak of this war was the result of a long process being driven forwards by a economic boom, far reaching agricultural and breeding progress and technological advances, which had sometimes been slowed down or even held back by events related to the war or to economic crises.

The central event of the last three generations was the dramatic increase in population and the consequent urbanisation of people.  Since the middle of the last century the population of Europe has almost doubled. Previous to that, it took a millennium to achieve such an increase and was made possible by biological and economic development over just two generations - this is without parallel in history.  Equally unparalleled was the industrial development over the same period, whose inception was long ago but whose results will only be known at the end of the 20th century. 

If such an industrial boom did take place, it was accompanied by far reaching changes in the division of labour and the way in which the population fed itself.  Both processes are of great significance from now on, not only for the entire social structure, but also for agricultural development and the food economy in most countries.  Urban and industrial centres attracted surplus inhabitants, so that numbers of people in rural areas generally stayed the same.  Thus the percentage of this part of the population grew smaller and it is a process that still goes on in individual countries, especially Germany.  The demographic effects cannot be overstated.

One can roughly estimate that even at the start of the 19th century almost a fifth of Europe’s population lived in the countryside, was employed in agriculture or agriculture-related work.  In Germany and Belgium the figure is now a quarter; in Holland, Denmark, Norway and Sweden just a third; in France and Italy around a half and in the 

overpopulated, agricultural nations of south Europe almost four-fifths of the whole population.  Thus there were pressing concerns about the preservation of a minority and various attempts to relieve the overpopulation of the flat land and to increase the low work productivity by increasing field yields.

These population structure differences and the division of labour among the employed are a reflection of the industrial production sites, which are concentrated in central Europe, namely down from the North Sea over central Germany, up to the edge of the Carpathian mountains.  The areas right on the periphery of this area are of a predominantly agricultural character.

The people in the industrial countries were faced with the task of providing not only a constantly growing population with essential foodstuffs and agricultural raw materials, but also satisfying increasing demands for higher product quality.  Along with the population increase and the social changes came the well-known changes in eating habits.  These has not been any other process, which has so influenced the direction of agricultural production and the whole structure of the European food economy, than the shift in human eating habits from vegetable to animal products.

The pressure created by the population increase and higher consumption demanded that European countries grow cultivated crops that produce higher gross yields and also the highest food yields.  This was true for the majority of root crops: potatoes, sugar beet and the other important types of vegetable.  Root crops and vegetables require more work and fertiliser than the various types of cereals, just as these do more than green fodder and pastureland.  The increased level of work, however, leads to higher yields which only much later are subject to the effects of the law of diminishing yield returns.  Firstly it was the mills supplying textiles, shepherding and cotton growing farms etc. which moved to other areas.  Shepherding, which needs large pasture areas and reached its peak in the 1860’s has dwindled to a tenth of its earlier level.  It was really since cotton took root in the undiscovered areas of America that shepherding moved away to the steppes of Argentina, Australia and South Africa.  This was the start of cotton competing with wool.  From these countries large amounts of raw material flowed into Europe where the textile industry and heavy industry were the focal point of industrial development.

A similar thing happened to the growing of trees, which entails a relatively high amount of manual work and is less suitable for mechanisation or, to be more precise, was less suitable than cultivated crops as technology stood at that time.  Thus it moved to regions where land was cheap and labour costs low, to eastern Europe and Russia which still supply a large part of the total world production.

The development is different, at least in parts of countries, for the three most important commodities for human nutrition: cereals, meat and fat.  Europe could generally supply itself to the extent that the individual countries made crop production the main priority in the formation of their trade and agricultural policies, thus mobilising the means of production of their own land.  They wanted to keep as far as possible the production of bread and animal production in their own country.  However, this latter aim was not achieved in most countries.

Just as a point, Great Britain converted to total free trade soon after the Napoleonic Wars due to their feeling of absolute maritime superiority and abandoned its agriculture for ‘extensivisation’.  As a result, its source of food was moved increasingly outside its borders.  Firstly England took the available surpluses of cereal in Europe, refined animal products and wool, until the demand from those countries of origin were able to absorb these surpluses themselves.  Then food and raw material supply moved increasingly to occupied areas overseas.  After their virgin agricultural areas were inhabited and developed, they were exposed more and more to world trade.  The agricultural economies of Denmark and Holland embraced division of labour and were used to supply the English food economy to the extent where those countries imported large amounts of cereals and foodstuffs and then sent the valuable end products gained from livestock-holding and dairies to the English market.  The final result in the years preceding the outbreak of war was that England’s importation just of bread cereal and animal feed was 10-11m tons more the import surplus of the whole of Europe.  Great Britain also had a larger supply need of the important food types than the whole of Europe.  The import surplus of sugar was 2m tons, meat 1.5m tons and fat 0.8m tons.  Calculated in terms of calories, England accounted for 20% of all food consumption.

The German agricultural economy was able to keep pace the longest with growing demand for food by increasing its agricultural production.  Nevertheless its varying agricultural policy at times lacked some important conditions for an intensivisation of production.  All the same, the agricultural duty policy was generally structured in such a way that the influence of the world market on the price of German bread grain was greatly reduced.  The duties for bread grain relative to those for animal products were much lower, but they were effective enough in conjunction with veterinary measures to keep imports in proportion to total consumption.  The only gap in the German duty tariff then was the low duty for animal feed cereal and the zero rating for protein foodstuffs.  It was a gap through which the huge amounts of animal feed cereals flowed into central Europe mainly from Russia before 1914.  This was to support not only Denmark’s livestock economy but also Germany’s growing stock of cattle, after it no longer became possible for its own production to keep pace.

Due to this varied agricultural and trade structure, Germany’s land and food economy embarked on its famous course.  After the great agricultural reforms, which meant the farming economies were freed from feudalism and individuals were able use their own energy, the fields of the most important types of food could be extended and their yields considerably raised.  Important pioneering work for the cultivation of sandy soil was achieved by the use of fertilisers and forage plants.  They introduced arable land to our heath areas together with the potato and made large parts of eastern Germany with its light soil cultivatable.  Then commercial fertilisers were used to increase the soil’s fertility and eventually made effective the planned growing of cereals, potatoes and sugar beet.  Equipped with these aids and great technological ability, Germany’s agricultural economy after 1885 could not only keep pace with its growing population, but it significantly increased its per capita production of food.  It has been an amazing achievement to increase the yield of foodstuffs made on German soil by almost 70% since the formation of the Reich, despite the increasing flight from the countryside.

Germany’s agriculture even proved itself to be a match for the second change in eating habits which was the turn towards the consumption of animal products, as it doubled its cattle stock and meat production over four decades.  Moreover cattle rearing exceeded the capacity of the neglected animal feed economy, so dependence of imported produce started to grow.  That is not all!  As the increase in demand could not be covered by the supply of meat and fat, in addition to foreign feed, the following produce had to be imported: oil seed for the production of vegetable oil, lard, butter, eggs and dairy produce of all kinds.  The national task, therefore, to produce locally the minimum subsistence level remained unresolved initially.  Over the last three years prior to the First World War (1914-1918) around one fifth of all wheat, one third of concentrated feed for Germany’s livestock and almost one half of all cooking oil consumed was imported.

As a result of the division of labour, the Danish and Dutch agriculture, with a greatly extended refining industry, filled the gap to supply animal products for England and Germany - the former’s supply being large, the latter’s small.

Both of these nations were powerful, industrial nations with high levels of consumption, facing the sea, with small raw material resources, a free trade policy and an open farming sector, but they could match the competition in cereal production from the newly opened overseas territories.  They shifted the focus of agricultural production to livestock rearing, the valuable products of which, firstly at least, were away from the triumphant competition presented by overseas trade on a mass scale.

First of all, it was cattle rearing and the dairy economy, which took off quickly in both countries.  Then followed swine-mast as bacon production intended for the English market, finally hen rearing and egg production became widespread.  This powerful and unique refining apparatus was not only born by locally produced feed, by it had to be supplemented increasingly by imported cereal and feed.  This despite a thorough intensivisation in its own feed production and the fact that they soon had the highest yields in cereal and feed root crops of all the European countries.

International division of labour affected both countries - but in a different way.  Animal feeding did not only limit itself to cereal feed, but it also included significant parts of the bread cereals harvest, in order to use the proceeds from the resultant and exported products to import high grade bakery wheat from overseas.  From time to time, Holland deliberately reined in the production of bread cereals, in order to make the freed up areas available for the production of vegetables and export-bound horticultural produce.  Finally both countries preferred to consume margarine in spite of their butter surpluses and in this respect exceeded all other European nations.

That is how Denmark and Holland could rise to become leading exporters of refined produce, supported by an extended co-operative system and by dint of its standardized products, even before the war.  But one can see easily that the achievements in animal production in Denmark were based then, just as they are today, on only about three quarters of the total of feed coming from local production - in Holland a little over one half.

Belgium assumes a special position in the scheme of food economies.  It had a dense population structure among the European countries not taking into account the colonial areas since it became industrialised early on.  As a result, it was dependent on imports of bread cereals even before 1860 and had to increase them accordingly and diversify into feed cereals and oil seed in line with the increase in population and consumer demand.  Although Belgium was able to maintain above average hectare yields and a high production volume, imports of cereal and feed swelled greatly, without the possibility as in Denmark and Holland to produce large amounts of animal products for export.

The production of refined goods instead remained limited in the main to demand in the home market.  Nonetheless with its population density and high degree of industrialisation, Belgium became the country in Europe which had the greatest dependence factor where food was concerned.  Thus, in spite of help from Germany, it had to adapt and ration what it consumed the most.

France’s agricultural economy lacked a developmental impulse of its own, due to its biological stagnation and its poor industrial growth record.  Whereas other central and north European countries intensified their farming and increased yields, France saw in certain areas a noticeably backward trend.  Its hectare yields were maintained but were below the European average and arable land was reduced.  Fallow land grew and feed production increased - all the hallmarks of an extensive farming system, although the natural conditions in many areas were receptive to intensive farming.  Without any internal pressure, France became dependent on foreign countries and thus increasingly on overseas imports.  Leading up to the war, its dependence on imported cereals was on average 8-10% of total consumption.  In actual fact, France could have exported that amount by utilising its available resources.

One ought to assume that a development which considerably raised the demand of densely populated European countries for cereal and oil seed would have led to the full realisation of the Balkan nations’ agricultures.  Either that was not the case or only partly the case.  Areas suitable for farming increased and hectare yields grew but these increases remained well behind those achieved elsewhere in Europe.  Generally the countries to the south-east failed to emerge from their extensive agriculture status according to world economic conditions.  That was because cereal surpluses, with the distance to market in central Europe and in competition with overseas territories, could only be brought in at prices so low that intensivisation remained an impossibility.

Then there came, as they still do today, the countries’ farming and pastural limitations, through which reforms became strengthened after the war.  There were the smaller farms with a lot of owners separated by boundaries, barely accessible by roads, with totally inadequate equipment, lacking plant and machinery with which to fight crop diseases.  In the continental climate this situation led to extraordinary shortfalls and variations in yields.  Even now hectare yields for cereals amount to only half of Germany’s, a situation which got worse in the flat areas of the south-east where overpopulation existed.

In central and north-western Europe there was some correlation between arable farming and livestock rearing (without whose symbiosis the yield increases of the last decades would have been unthinkable).  Whereas in the south-eastern countries, livestock rearing was only an add-on part for arable farming and annual production was less than half of Germany’s.

The Formation of the Division of Labour in World Agriculture

Thus it happened that division of labour steadily took a hold in farming in central Europe and left, in the process, large natural resources unexploited in Europe.  The most obvious case was that concerning cooking oils.  As consumption of this oil extended in the industrial countries, there was a strong upturn in the production of animal fats, which in turn opened up overseas grazing areas for the extensive form of livestock holding.  These mainly supplied hides, wool and fat.  When animal fats could no longer meet demand, oil seed was planted on a more widespread basis firstly in the tropical countries, later in the temperate areas of Asia, particularly in Manchuria.  As a consequence, the production of oil fruit got less and less and finally reached its lowest point ever.

At first, animal fats could compete with plant oils until the point when technical advances in refining and solidifying brought more and more new applications for plant oil, ending up with blubber being used to produce margarine.

A century then, of technological, economic and agricultural development for the European food economy which took on an altogether new course.  Europe entered the 19th century as an agricultural area, mainly exporting its ground produce, and left it as an industrialised one essentially linked to the entire world, no longer unable to feed its own people from its own soil.  There were two types of labour division resulting from this change, which we will deal with.  The first one happened between agriculture and industry.  Local agriculture became more and more removed from the processing and refining of natural produce, which became commercially autonomous.  Furthermore, agriculture was replaced more and more by industry for supplying the population with consumer goods and it also became increasingly dependent on industry for the supply of fertilisers, machines and other farming equipment.  Rural industry and soil cultivation grew steadily into two self-complementing, large national labour and sales areas.  This process of national labour division became embedded in the larger one taking place on an international scale.  This is a healthy proposition for the exchanging of those products which cannot be locally grown due to climatic reasons or which are insufficient from local sources because of quantity or quality.  The barter of such goods leads to an increase in the output of all countries involved and living standards go up, provided peaceful conditions exist.  Peoples’ wealth and lives are threatened, the more the increasing population has to rely on the regular supply of goods from other economies and, as a result, local agriculture recedes as an area for supply and sales.  People are in constant danger, when that happens to such a degree that one’s own soil does not provide the minimum for existence.  At the outbreak of World War I, most European countries were in this situation.

Of course, the formation of labour division in agriculture is not just a negative thing.  As now, at least in certain areas, it was a time of social progress.  Despite the growth of many new cities and the increasing wealth, prices increased little i.e. the working masses were not forced from consuming.  In central and western European countries, farming had a higher status than that of previous generations and farm yields were sufficient to provide succeeding sons with land to live off or to prepare them for new vocations.

However, the external economic dangers were not to be underestimated and in 1914 the war broke up everything.  The burden of economic sanctions was mainly born by our people, whereas western Europe, with its vast colonial areas, enjoyed a high degree of economic balance.  The war was between those countries with land and those without land in central Europe.  Even the countries engaged in refining goods in north western Europe were not protected from economic difficulties, as the English blockade only allowed so much cereal and feed stuff to be shipped to meet the urgent needs of their people.
Germany’s dependence on foreign goods with its fatal consequences became gravely apparent when the large supplies of foodstuff, which had been available at the start of the war, slowly began to dry up.  That led to the well-known situation where our livestock levels were heavily reduced and subsequently created a lack of supply of meat and fat.  This had a knock-on effect on the available output, since manure and plant feed were now in short supply.  As a result, the production of nitrogenous fertiliser was developed during the course of the war. Thus things came full circle and the food shortage situation was solved, which had brought us so closely together.

Production Increase in Germany and Italy

The major lesson of the world war was that in times of external economic strife people can only be supplied with essential foods, if besides meeting the demand for bread and potato, supplies for cattle rearing comes mainly from foodstuff of local origin.  If these preconditions are not fulfilled, then imports have to be drastically cut back in times of difficulty.  Inevitably then, meat and fat supplies are also adversely affected.

Out of the European countries, Germany and Italy were just about the only ones, which drew this unfortunate lesson from the last war and from the subsequent crises when it came to management of their agricultural policies.  Germany, in particular, developed its production the most in a diverse and effective range of measures.  The first step to protecting farming from the changeable, economic sets of conditions and from the blows delivered by the free market economy was the Reich’s law of ‘Entailed Estate’.  The second step is the reforming of market relationships and the system of fixed prices, which grants total primacy to the principle of vegetable production.  It also lends the strongest support to those branches of production, which hold the largest reserves of produce and can release them for human consumption.  The market order proved itself suitable, too, for directing free trade between nations in agricultural products along controlled and mutually beneficial lines.

I want to leave the question open here whether the laws of the land will see some relaxation over time.  We should not forget the fact that fixed prices, as a statistical system within a dynamic economy, do require adjustment now and again.  But one thing is certain, that if agriculture is freed from its market-political function and the systematic stabilisation of agricultural markets is placed into the hands of government authorised bodies, it could devote itself with full energy to its economic task of feeding people.  The result of these efforts in the last decade is an increase in the total output of produce, expressed in cereal values, by more than 15%.  The same increase, which previously required several decades, was reached in a few years, although agriculture suffered from an increasing lack of workers.  It is thanks to this output increase that food supply developed without problems in spite of the increased consumption of bread, cereal and potato since the outbreak of the war.  Indeed it will continue to develop, although it was always clear that the consumer would face with considerable privations.

Even Italy was able to increase its produce output by 20% in the last two decades and showed less dependence on cereal supply during average harvests than Germany.  Besides this, the damage wrought by the world war in the countries that were specialised in refining products was made good in a few years and the livestock levels were built up again.  The only far reaching change was in the supply of cereal feed in Europe, when Russia practically ceased to be a cereal supplier after the world war and maize from Argentina took the place of Russian barley feed.  

In the meantime, the course of events made the food problems into something peculiar to Europe and for Germany in particular the problems did not get any easier.  It is, in fact, true that the agriculture of the regained provinces in the east underwent a quick process of intensivisation, and it is also true that there are still large product reserves to be utilised not only in France but also in the south- eastern countries; also the south Russian areas are some of the most productive ones for cereal in the world.  However, it must be stressed that successful agricultural planning requires a longer period of time and additional amounts of agricultural equipment, which was only available on a limited basis during the war.  One should not overlook the fact, though, that the war did not leave the production apparatus of certain areas untouched or that the south eastern nations and Poland before the war were the only group of countries within the food economy of Europe that produced a consistent export surplus of cereal and oil seed.  This amounted to 2.5-3m tons per annum against Europe’s requirement for the same products of about 14m tons.

The Supply Situation under the Influence of Economic Restrictions and Change

It would take too long to discuss this topic in any great detail, but the basic questions can be set out in a few words.

In the last two decades, there were considerable increases in harvest production since the leading agricultural countries quickly made advances in farming technology.  In fact, the average annual increase in produce exceeded any increase in demand.  Thus, Europe’s output of cereal and potatoes grew from 140m tons in 1928 to 160m tons, the average figure for the period 1936-1938; as a result, the import surplus could be reduced from 20 to 10m tons over the period despite rising demand.  It must be considered that the refining countries of north west Europe exported to England about 2-2.5m tons of animal products derived from their imports of cereal and animal feed.  Basing on a total European supply of 160m tons, one can calculate that Europe’s import demand was only about 5% different from the usual demand level in peacetime.

The harvests of cereal and potatoes were used in three ways.  A small proportion, about 20m tons (12-14%) remains on the farms as seed.  By far the largest proportion is needed to support the consumption of bread and potatoes; roughly estimated, it amounts to about 80m tons or a good 50% of the total harvest.  The left-overs serve as the basis for animal food and thus for all meat, fat and egg production etc. which has been augmented by products from the mill trade and the waste from related technological businesses.  As demand for seed, bread and potatoes tends to remain at a constant level, any variations in harvest or any drops in imports have a direct effect on food production and supply to breweries, distilleries, etc.  Of particular consequence for the food economy is the fact that refining food entails considerable losses in nutritional values.  The size of loss depends on the type of refining; for example, for milk production it is 75%, pork production 75-80%, egg production 90%.  Pigs and poultry have the characteristic that they need rich food, particularly cereal and potatoes, i.e. ground produce which also serves for human consumption.  The proportions are a little different for cows and sheep than the concentrated feed and cereal that simply have to make cost effective the production of hay and root crops which make up most of the feed ration.  Therefore, when there is short supply of vegetables, livestock can become a dangerous competitor for food to humans and, in that case, have to be subject to appropriate limitations.  Even the processing of ground produce into beer and brandy causes considerable losses of energy.  Thus, at least in a small way, this affects luxury goods, which are irrelevant in times of need. 

The larger the proportion of animal products in everyday food, the bigger the growing areas have to be (all things being equal), which are required to feed every inhabitant and vice versa.  The eating habits of Europe’s people vary within rather wide boundaries.  For example, the annual meat consumption in western and northern Europe amounts to 40-45 kg compared to 12-15 kg in south-eastern Europe.  The latter’s fat consumption is about half and for sugar it is even less.  The more difficult it is to significantly increase ground produce, the more important it is to set out priorities in rationing, roughly in the following order: bread, processed food, potatoes, fat, vegetables and meat.  This principle applies across Europe as a whole.  It is one of the most difficult and important measures of food policy - not just in times of emergency - to find the ‘medial section’, i.e. to define the dimensions of the harvest disposal through corresponding price setting and other appropriate measures in the interest of the total population’s nourishment.  Protection of the bread cereal reserves also means free play to extend vegetable oil growing in individual countries.  This in its highest forms (rapeseed, sunflower and soya cultivation in every European climatic area) is by far superior to the other fat sources in terms of production per land unit.  Individual European countries particularly demonstrate the strongest dependence on the supply of fat.

Although Germany’s and south-east Europe’s efforts succeeded in doubling Europe’s production of oil seed in the last 10 years, raising it to around 1m tons, Europe’s average importation in the years leading up to the war was about 5m tons.  One also has to remember that oil seed has a second rôle concerning the supply of fat.  Firstly, it provides raw materials for margarine production and then oil-cake as valuable milk yield feed.  Evaluation and consideration of these functions of oil seed in the economy of fat leads to the conclusion that about 30% of European fat consumption is from overseas imports.

Looking at the picture as a whole, Europe’s food problems stem primarily from the question of the supply of livestock feed.  From an economic farming perspective, it is necessary to refine one of the conclusions made about demand for cereal imports varying from normal peacetime consumption levels by about 5%.  What should be added is that after the guarantee of the bread and potato demand and the required seed stock, amounting to 100-150m tons of cereal in Europe, there is an amount remaining for animal feed purposes and technical business, which had to be augmented by about one fifth from imports overseas to guarantee the supplies for livestock, and thus the earlier supply of meat and fat.

These dependencies are the main explanation why, during the effects of economic sanction, considerable economic privations were experienced by the pig and poultry stock in the refining countries of Denmark, Holland and Belgium.  In turn, there were similar consequences for the farm organisation and for the output of meat and fat.

Political Consequences for Production 

Having attempted so far to describe the problems of Europe’s farm and food economy over the last decades from a farming economic perspective, I now want to briefly draw some conclusions concerning production and politics.

Due to the special conditions of wartime, problems of distribution always come to the fore.  However, we do not want to overlook the efforts made by almost every country to derive higher yields from the soil and to guide production in a direction, which meets the needs of food supply.  Above all, we need to recognise the forces, which go to create a different picture of European farming, in the sense of a stronger shift of focus towards the centre of Europe.

Such a gradual change of this nature is worth striving for in order to ensure that Europe does not just remain a huge consumer market for food, whose essential food sources lie overseas and whose trade routes could be threatened.  Such European community work requires not only the insight of everyone involved but also places upon them serious agricultural tasks and a high level of responsibility.  The solution of these tasks will take a great deal of time.  

Whoever has studied in detail the changes in economic structure after the war, particularly the effects of the world economic crisis, could not ignore the fact that the measures taken by all nations in order to free themselves from the economic chaos, such as duties, quotas, monopolising of foreign trade, forced appropriation and internal planning, were about deep-rooted processes, as well as ways to cope with the economic woes of the time.  Even the refining countries, whose farming sectors derived some benefit from the world division of labour, got dragged into the mess of the world economic crisis.  This happened particularly due to England’s withdrawal from the European economy and its about-face on duties and the Ottawa Treaties, which happened even during the classic period of free trade.  

The special threat to agriculture even before the war made everyone aware that the rural population was the foundation of the whole economic structure.  It was the producer of bread, our great energy provider and bearer of those virtues that are rooted in farmers’ work ethic.  The desire for a new order is more discernible in the individual countries, when economic events threaten the supply of their staple foods and a powerful leadership is able to direct the will and energy of a whole working sector and an entire nation towards a single goal.

I have already mentioned the main traits of national socialistic agricultural policy to which I can add that the German example has acted as an inspiration for other countries’ food sectors.

Possibilities of Increasing Europe’s Food Production

In order to increase food output, farming has four options:

1.	Extension of cultivated land by including all areas that can be cultivated with the technology available at the time.

2.	Increase in field yields.

3.	More intensive use of the soil through an appropriate crop arrangement on arable land.  Generally, output is higher when grassland recedes or intensive farming methods are introduced and arable land is cleared for productive crops such as root crops and vegetables etc.

4.	Increase in production of livestock as the basis of meat and fat supply by advances in plant breeding and efficient feeding.

Then there are the possibilities of reducing harvest losses by drainage, conservation and improvement of roads and also other technological advances, which preserve fields producing food.  The last two options do not immediately increase soil produce but they contribute so that areas suitable for farming and the produce created are used for human nutrition.  Since the intensivisation process tends to follow the order given above and varying degrees of it have already been achieved in individual countries, the options still to be adopted can be very different and, therefore, can only be pointed out here.

Production increases are achieved most quickly by extending the areas of cultivation and improvement of wasteland and the restriction of fallow land etc.  In those central European countries where intensive methods are used, the amount of land with these features is small, if one discounts the land reclaimed around the coastal area and moorland.

Looking towards the east and south-east, the conditions are quite different.  In these areas fallow land comprised mainly of arable ground and throughout the south-east around the unregulated rivers and tributaries there are large areas, which, cannot be or can only be used in an extensive way following insufficient drainage.  In Bulgaria and other regions there are arid areas, to which water can be brought.  Experience has shown that the land in the old Polish regions is most conducive for ploughing because the agricultural conditions are more favourable.  Even in France large and fertile expanses of land are crying out to be cultivated having lain idle for decades due to the movement to the cities.  Some measures taken since the armistice might manage to avoid an odd tribulation, but now numerous signs indicate that a deep rooted change and a revitalisation movement is taking place.  Not only a resettlement of these deserted areas is sought but also there is a drive to elevate agriculture to become the basis of a whole social structure.  Just the inclusion of those fruit growing areas, which were turned into fallow land after the 1914-18 war or used for grass growing, would add two million tons of cereal (given France’s low average yields).

As high as the reserves of food areas can be estimated to be in the individual countries, a meaningful development for Europe’s food problem cannot be expected from here.  More significant is what intensive farming methods can achieve.

The stark differences in hectare yields show most clearly now each country’s performances vary.  The countries in the south-east are about half and France about two-thirds of Germany’s output, whereas the coastal countries in north-west Europe have achieved figures which exceed Germany’s by a long way on account of their natural conditions and highly developed soil cultivation.  Just increasing the average European hectare yield by about 8% would cover the amount of cereal imported in the lead up to the war.  

Hectare yields are the result of the combination of soil and climate conditions, the selection of crop types, growing methods and fertilising etc. High reliable yields can only be achieved if all of the factors are in a favourable proportion to each other.  In the arable regions of the south-east, the soil conditions can be described as truly favourable.  However, the circumstances surrounding their military defeat mean there are certain limits to what can be done with those resources.  Given this set of conditions, greater importance needs to be placed upon type selection, resisting plant disease and a soil cultivation method based on retaining soil moisture.  On one side there is the need to confront the idea that agriculture in south-east Europe should adapt technologically to reach Germany's level.  On the other, it needs to be emphasised that a far-reaching change in the farming economy can only be achieved if there is sufficient availability of the required technological equipment.  Equipment for increasing yields, crop breeding and fertilising count as the most effective levers.

Here are just a few examples that show how the breeding of productive and hardy animal breeds and species of our most important vegetables can open new opportunities for increasing production.  With sugar beet it was possible in just a couple of decades to reduce the quantity of sugar beet required to create sugar from 1,500kg down to 600-700kg.  Processing methods have also made an impact.  Equally significant were the steps forward that were made in cereal and potato breeding.  The success of broad head wheat, the most commonly grown type in Europe, and of its cross breeds which in the early 1890’s were not proven even against the mild climate of north-west Germany, is mainly due to advances in plant breeding techniques.  Just as Lochow’s Petkus barley had a marked effect on barley yields, the breeds created by the Swedish, Danish and Dutch seed breeding institutes had a strong influence on the cereal, grass and vegetable yields.  Advances in breeding techniques were also responsible for making cotton cultivation in Bulgaria and sunflower and soya production in to a local type of product throughout the south-east.  Crop breeding will therefore remain an extremely effective means for the development of food production for Europe’s people.

The full impact in terms of productivity of the new types and vegetable types in relation to improved soil processing and cultivation could only be truly realised once commercial fertlilisers became more available. Almost three-quarters of the 1.5m tons pure nitrogen, which was the average production of Europe in the two years before the outbreak of this war, was used in Germany’s and north west Europe’s agriculture.  Belgium and Holland led Germany in their usage in terms of land area.  There was a similar relationship regarding phosphorous.

It is true that intensive fertilisation is particularly worthwhile in those areas exposed to the climatic influence of the Atlantic, and therefore France’s agriculture is presented with extraordinary opportunities.  In addition, farming in south-east Europe could make greater use of commercial fertiliser.

Italy is a notable example in this respect, as its agriculture has practically devoted its use of nitrogen and consequently increased its production considerably.  The natural conditions are more akin in south-east Europe and Italy than in relation to Germany.  Farming technology, on the other hand, does not reveal such differences.  The conclusion can therefore be drawn that considerable success can be expected from a more intensive use of fertiliser in the south-east countries.

If the positive and negative effects of the use of commercial fertiliser are evaluated, it would be no exaggeration to say that an increase of 50% can be expected from the use of commercial fertilisers within 5-10 years after a return to normal conditions.  For certain food types, the increase could be as much as 200%.  Thus, the chemical and fertiliser industries are faced with a considerable task.

The increase in cereal and feed production per hectare leads to the opening up of larger areas for growing those vegetables, which provide huge quantities of food material or fill gaps in the supply of fat or raw material.  In the humid farming areas of western and central Europe, it is potatoes, sugar beet and vegetables in particular that have by far the highest output per given area.  In south-east Europe, maize and oil producing plants give an intensive and more productive edge to its fruit farming industry.  Such a development provides three types of positive effect: workers get absorbed by the labour intensive environments, they increase the farmer’s income and they tend to relax the rather one-sided farming conditions.  Technological advances, agreements between nations and planned control of production ensure that farming organisations undergo a gradual process of change.

At last, crop protection and disease control for our animals became effective tools, as did progressive conservation methods and the reduction of yield and storage losses, which provided more and more food for human consumption. Important technology at the time included fermentation, drying, cooling and refrigeration.  Man was able to learn quite easily from nature about food drying; then there came other momentous changes like the preparation of ensilage today, artificial drying or the achievement of freezing temperatures.  Distant areas could now be accessed with the help of cooling and drying equipment; sales markets and consumers were brought several hundred kilometers nearer.

Taking a longer-term view, the opportunities for increasing food production are unimaginable, so much so that it seems quite possible for all food requirements to be met even with the increasing trend.

Beyond this it is possible to imagine a development, which releases areas for the farming of oil producing crops and industrial crops or which converts surplus amounts of 

carbohydrate into meat and fat, thereby slowly reducing our dependence on the usual supply of fat.  Such a development requires firstly planned support and market organisation, which would exclude strong price movement even where international trade was concerned.  This has already been achieved with the countries in the south-east through various agreements.

The virgin territory, which has to be discovered to extend food production possibilities for Europe’s people requires a sensible interaction between the various agricultures and economies.  Also it requires more research and education of everyone involved in agriculture in Europe.  For everywhere we look, it is not just areas of land and fertile areas but also tools for exploiting the soil, the spirit of invention and human deed, which determine the level of food production.  The human spirit has to shape all the technological advances in a creative way in order to make the soil fertile.  It does not matter whether these are derived from a deeper knowledge of our circumstances, which can introduce our farming people to a more planned type of interaction.

The efforts made by Europe’s agricultural sector to extend and finally safeguard enough room to produce food will only be successful if the number of people engaged in agriculture is maintained and a healthy growth relationship between it and industry is ensured.  The chaotic development in the economies of city and industry and the different working conditions, living situations and income relations made many millions of people rebellious over the last decade in rural areas of central and western Europe.  This struggle will flare again after the war unless there is a harmonious distribution of work forces in urban and rural areas.  In certain areas it will be difficult to maintain productivity.  The agricultural workforce has to be equipped with better technology and their work needs to be valued materially and morally so that the difference in living standards between city and countryside are removed.  The social consequences are of great importance.  

Certainly the machine can take a lot of work from man, but there are limits to its use.  What is needed is a healthy relationship in the balance and growth of the large organisations belonging to the nation’s agricultural sector and its industry.  If these conditions are met then food production will continue to be the farmer’s essential activity.  Not only does the farmer serve to sustain the people with food from the soil but also with another product of our mother soil: his own blood which flows out of the villages into the cities and supports all life.

We stand too close to the task of creating change and the future in order to be able to clearly recognise how the order of Europe’s agriculture will look or the full details of Europe’s food industry, but the outline can now be seen.

Our task will be to turn this outline into a solid structure and to bring it together.  It will only be firmly established if it is the result of peaceful co-operation between all of Europe’s people, borne out of the vital strength of spiritual ideas and a European economic community.

THE END OF WOERMANN’S essay.

YOU are perfectly at liberty, and are in fact encouraged, to download this document and make prints of it or distribute it electronically as you may wish.

We believe the more people who are made aware of the grim realities of this document, and the others in the series, as stepping stones to the present day EUropean Union and the deceit and dishonesty that has been essential in bringing the EU into being the better for mankind.

There is NO CopyRight on this document, which is one of many 1,000s of items freely available on http://www.SilentMajority.co.UK [some 20Mbs.] & 10s of 1,000s of items on The SilentMajority CD [with over 80Mbs.] which contains the entire web site & hosts other web sites also, 1,000s of apposite quotations, Articles, Speeches, Commentaries, ArtWork, & The FULL text of The EU Treaties, Several Related Books, The British Constitution, The American Constitution & Numerous related Items.
SilentMajority nor any associate thereof does NOT vouch for the veracity of the documents hosted on its site or CD nor any foreign language documents thereon & advises you consult your own solicitor on legal details as we do not accept liability for, nor presume to give legal advice ourselves.
For a copy of the CD please mail payment of £20.00 for UK deliver or £25.00 for ALL other Countries payable to:
Greg Lance – Watkins,
Glance Back Books,
17 Upper Church Street,
CHEPSTOW,
NP16 5EX
Monmouthshire,
GREAT BRITAIN
For delivery of 2 x CDs
one for your own use
+ one for on selling or donation to an individual of influence (media, politician, activist etc.)

IF YOU wish to use the Material Above, which is freely provided
Please have the Courtesy to Print It out in its entirety from start to finish with NO alterations, as displayed.
To This Point