Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 53.djvu/12

 under her conventional tariff 84.3 cents the quintal. Norway and Sweden, although both are dependent upon foreign supplies of wheat, pursue different policies. Norway levies a merely nominal duty of sixteen cents a quintal, but Sweden, importing a much larger quantity, collects one dollar a quintal. Switzerland, being in the same condition of dependence on imports, has a duty of only six cents a quintal, a purely revenue duty. Spain, a large importer, has framed a tariff on agricultural imports, particularly burdensome on wheat, the duty, both general and conventional, being two dollars per quintal. In the last year this high duty has brought increased revenue to the Spanish treasury, because the home supplies were deficient, and heavy importations necessitated. Italy, also a large importer, and a state whose treasury is in difficulties, imposes nearly as high a duty on wheat as Spain—one dollar and forty-five cents a quintal.

There are five countries in Europe producing an excess of wheat beyond their own needs: Russia, Hungary, Roumania, Bulgaria, and Servia. All these countries combined, it has been estimated, have in an ordinary year a surplus product of 26,500,000 hectolitres (75,000,000 bushels) available for export, or only what would make good the needs of Belgium, Switzerland, Holland, and the Scandinavian countries, leaving unsatisfied the far larger wants of the great consumers of wheat—the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Austria, and Italy—whose combined demand is placed at 152,000,000 hectolitres (430,700,000 bushels) beyond their own production. Even in the best of years Europe, then, is not self-sufficient in wheat.

Merely to compare supply and demand will not give a proper idea of the importance of the wheat question to Europe. From the measures of two of the leading commercial nations—France and Germany—the political aspect is made clear. To be supplied as far as is possible from their own production is the aim of their statesmen, and the problem of accomplishing this end has been enormously complicated by the rise of wheat-growing countries over the sea. Instead of accepting the situation as England did, and welcoming supplies of the highest grades of food produced at a very low cost, France and Germany have sought to neutralize this outside competition by customs duties more or less protective in their effect. As these duties were intended to quiet political restlessness at home, the non-economic aspects are important. Indeed, agrarianism in these two countries suggests silver and prohibitive duties rather than a movement to improve the condition of the farming population.

The economic position of France is peculiar. It is the land of the small proprietor, and in no neighboring country has the division of land (petit morcellement) been carried so far. It claims to be