Promoting Farm Mechanization
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FOLLOWING •a report from the Agricultural Improvement Council, the Minister of , Agriculture and Fisheries and the Secretary of 'State for Scotland set up, early this year, an Agricultural Machinery Development Board for Great Britain. It comprises progressive farmers familiar with the problems of mechanization, manufacturers of implements, repre
sentatives of agricultural-labour organizations, the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research. and the Agricultural Research Council. The chairman of this Board is Lord Itadnor, and it consists of 18 members.
The duties are to arrange for the testing of agricultural machinery and implements and to consider questions as to standardization, the provision of educational and advisory facilities—in fact, it will act as a general clearing house for . information regarding agricultural machinery and its use.
To discharge these important functions, the. Board requires a highly qualified staff of agriculturists and engineers with adequate workshop facilities. Therefore, the provision of a :National Institute of Agricultural Engineering has 'been the first big problem to engage its attention. This Institute is °being set up at Askham Bryan, near York, and the nucleus is the Institute of Research in Agricultural Engineering at Oxford, which the University has handed over to the Ministry. Its director, Mr. S. J. Wright, M.A., has been appointed director of the new. body. Temporarily, the Institute will be housed in buildings belonging to 'the Yorkshire Council for. Agricultural Education, but, later, will have a permanent *home at the place,. mentioned. As a further step in the promotion of its objects the Board has set up an Inventions Committee.