Wellmann Imre szerk.: A Magyar Mezőgazdasági Múzeum Közleményei 1971-1972 (Budapest, 1973)
Minchinton, Walter E.: The agricultural regions of England and Wales
differing from Dr THIRSK to some considerable extent. 17 Whereas Dr THIRSK divides the Midland plain into a number of regions, Dr KERRIDGE treats it as a single unit and there are other significant differences. Thus the employment of a qualitative basis in order to establish the farming countries of England and Wales is a subjective matter. Since judgements will differ, there will not be complete agreement about the regional pattern which results from the employment of the method. The most significant move in regional classification in the past thirty years or so has been the move from qualitative assessment to quantitative assessment. In 1939 the Ministry of Agriculture made the first attempt to map the types of farming in England and Wales on a uniform basis. 18 Areas were classified on two broad principles, on the kind of husbandry carried out — whether pasture, intermediate or arable — and the character of the enterprises involved. Affecting the localisation of the different types of farming were a number of factors: rainfall, temperature and sunshine, elevation, soil conditions and market factors. The final list emerging from this assessment consisted of 17 types of farming 19 (together with a further three categories of land which it proved difficult to classify). 20 Such was the diversity of practice that twenty farming types were regarded as necessary to describe the conduct of agriculture in England and Wales on the eve of the second world war. Scientific as it seemed at the time, later critics have pointed out the inevitable subjectivity of the techniques employed. More recently a map of the types of farming based on agricultural census data for 1965 has been produc1 "KERRIDGE, E. op. cit. 41—180. Dr KERRIDGE notes (op. cit. 41) "the whole kingdom (of England and Wales) may be assigned to various of these farming countries or to their areas of merger save only one, the Bristol quarter, a residual district where no general plan of management is discernible. Soils, subsoils, bases, terrain, topography, and climatures were all diverse; nor did the metropolis of Bristol exert sufficiant influence to promote any considerable degree of similarity in plans of farm management. The whole quarter was a vast area of merger and of the confusion of the farming practices of the neighbouring countries, outlying portions of whose natural features occurred haphazardly throughout the quarter. In consequence, the only generalization that can be made about the husbandry of the Bristol quarter is to say that it was highly diversified." 18 The map and explanatory text were published by the Land Utilisation Survey of Britain in 1941. Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries, Types of farming map of England and Wales. HMSO 1941. ^'Subdivisions were made within three main types, pastoral, intermediate and arable, as follows: Pasture types, A predominantly dairying; B dairying and other enterprises; C grazing and dairying; D rearing supplemented by other enterprises; and E mainly rearing and sheep grazing. — Intermediate types, F mixed farming with substantial dairying; G mixed farming with substantial rearing or feeding; H general mixed farming; I corn, sheep and dairying; J mainly wheat and cattle; and K other intermediate types with fruit, vegetables or hops. — Arable types, L mixed farming based on arable production; M mainly corn and sheep; N corn and sheep supplemented with cash crops; O mainly cash farming; P market gardening; and Q other arable types. -"Classified as: X land of little agricultural value; Y marshes; and Z varied farming on mixed soils or unclassified.
