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During the last year or so the question has often been raised "Does an
allotment pay?" Following Dr. Joad's example, it all depends on what you
mean by pay. And whom does it pay? The Ministry of Agriculture has from time
to time published the financial returns of demonstration allotments in
different parts of the country, which showed that crops to the value of
anything from £20 to
£30, at retail prices had been grown on
10 rods. Records of about a hundred 10-rod plots kept in 1940-41 showed an
average of nearly 20 lb. edible weight of vegetables weekly in winter, the
figures for the other seasons being, spring, 11 lb.; summer, 12 lb.; autumn,
15 lb. Of course, there is far more to it than mere financial
returns, though the thrifty housewife would be the first to acknowledge what
a help it is, in these days of high prices, to have her "good man" bring her
home vegetables in variety that cost a good deal to buy in the shops. She
knows, too, how important a part vegetables play in maintaining family
health.
The "good man" himself may not, perhaps, have thought about
the allotment first from the economic angle. His attitude depends on whether
he had a plot before the war, or took it on after the war started. No doubt
the pre-war allotment holder felt that call of the land and the allotment
was his pastime. The war-time cultivator would probably say that he wanted
to make sure of vegetables for his family; in some cases he may have feared
a food shortage or patriotically desired to help the national food
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Whatever the motive that prompted the man to take on an allotment, he has
benefited himself: he is generally better in health because of the exercise,
better in spirit because cultivating his plot took his mind off the war or
the burdens of office or workshop ; he has benefited his family by providing
fresh vegetables that kept them fit—and, incidentally helped his wife
in trying to make ends meet and avoid queues ;
he and his fellow "Victory Diggers" benefited their country by contributing
in every year of the war a substantial and indispensable quantity of food to
the national larder, without which the nation might well have had to go
short, not only of vegetables but of other food which our farmers have been
enabled to grow through the "Victory Diggers" efforts. Does an allotment
pay? Emphatically it does, provided it is well managed and efficiently
cultivated. And the same goes for the private vegetable garden, too.
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