Page:Indian Journal of Economics Volume 2.djvu/161

 SOUTH INDIAN ECONOMICS the efficiency with which agricultural work is done. Where the average worker produces a high output, it is possible for the average income to be high; where the average output of the worker is verysmall the average income must necessarily be very low. The first thing therefore that one naturally inquires into is the amount of work done in a day by the agri- cultural worker. I watched .with amazement the harvesters at work in the paddy field. They squatted on the ground and each man grasped with his hand the stalks of paddy that came from one root and severed them close to e ground with a blow from the sickle. He then gently deposited the bundle behind him, shuffled a few inches, still squatting, and repeated the operation. I, asked how many men it *,ook to cut an acre in a day. The answer was eight, and that WOlen were necessary in addition to carry the crop to the threshing floor. This was in South Avcom. In Mysore in the neighbourhood of Bangalore I was told that it was the custom for women to cut the corn and for men to carry it, and that here it took 15 women a day to cut one acre. Now in England when we cut corn we.do it by machinery, and oue nan driving a cutting and binding machine can, I believe, qdte easily cut and bind six acres in a day. But if we put this aside and compare instead harvesting in England as i was before machinery came ino use, when corn was cut with the scythe, one man would cut ordinarily between one and two acres per day. Agricultural operations are very varied and it is extremely difcult to make any fair comparison between he efficiency of Indian agricultural labor and English. But making a very hazardous estimate I should say hat the produce of an English agricultural laborer's day's work is about n times as grea as that of he Indian, this English superiority being due partly to the Englishman's