Farmers of Forty Centuries; Or, Permanent Agriculture in China, Korea, and JapanKing, F. H. (Franklin Hiram)
Science
Farmers of Forty Centuries; Or, Permanent Agriculture in China, Korea, and Japan
King, F. H. (Franklin Hiram)
Agriculture -- China; Agriculture -- Japan; Agriculture -- Korea
These figures reveal something of the tense strain and of the
terrible burden which is being carried by these people, over and
above that required for the maintenance of the household. The tenant
who raises one crop of rice pays a rental of $23.89 per acre. If he
raises two crops he pays $31.58; if it is upland field, he pays
$13.52. To these amounts he adds $10.33, $21.52 or $13.45
respectively for fertilizer, seed and other expenses making a total
investment of $34.22, $53.10 or $26.97 per acre, which would require
as many bushels of wheat sold at a dollar a bushel to cover this
cost. In addition to this he assumes all the risks of loss from
weather, from insects and from blight, in the hope that he may
recoup his expenses and in addition have for his services $14.81,
$25.52 or $14.39 for the season's work.
The burdens of society, which have been and still are so largely
burdens of war and of government, with all nations, are reflected
with almost blinding effect in the land taxes of Japan, which range
from $1.98, on the upland, to $7.34 per acre on the paddy fields,
making a quarter section, without buildings, carry a burden of $300
to $1100 annually. Japan's budget in 1907 was $134,941,113, which is
at the rate of $2.60 for each man, woman and child; $8.90 for each
acre of cultivated land, and $23, for each household in the Empire.
When such is the case it is not strange that scenes like Fig. 248
are common in Japan today where, after seventy years, toil may not
cease.
There is a bright, as well as a pathetic side to scenes like this.
The two have shared for fifty years, but if the days have been full
of toil, with them have come strength of body, of mind and sterling
character. If the burdens have been heavy, each has made the other's
lighter, the satisfaction fuller, the joys keener, the sorrows less
difficult to bear; and the children who came into the home and have
gone from it to perpetuate new ones, could not well be other than
such as to contribute to the foundations of nations of great
strength and long endurance.
Reference has been made to the large amount of work carried on in
the farmers' households by the women and children, and by the men
when they are not otherwise employed, and the earnings of this
subsidiary work have materially helped to piece out the meagre
income and to meet the relatively high taxes and rent.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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