AGRICULTURE

"Nature has endowed Mexico," says one writer, "with almost unlimited agricultural possibilities. Her resources include extensive and fertile irrigable lands, large areas covered with valuable forests of both hard and soft woods, climatic conditions that permit the raising of a wide variety of vegetable products, and regions adapted to nearly every kind of temperate and tropical fruit." Cereals common to more northern lands are grown on the high plateau of central Mexico. Cotton and tobacco are produced from Lower California to Yucatán. Almost all fruits and vegetables which flourish in the United States are equally well adapted to the Southern Republic. In addition there are numer ous products, some of which are among the most valuable of Mexican exports, whose very names are unfamiliar to the average citizen of North America.

Among these products peculiar to Mexican agriculture may be listed henequen, from which comes the binder twine used in Dakota and Kansas wheat fields; chicle, the basic element of chewing gum; guayule, a rubber extracted from one of the semidesert shrubs; pochote, a vegetable silk; candelilla, a vegetable wax; ixtle, or Tampico fiber, as it is known to commerce; liquors, such as tequila and pulque, derived from the maguey plant and used almost wholly for domestic consumption; coffee, cocoa, sarsaparilla, vanilla, indigo, cochineal, and a score of other tropic or semi-tropic products widely used, but rarely grown, in the United States.

Unfortunately, no adequate data of Mexican crop production have ever been assembled. Two distinct types of farming prevail: the one for individual consumption; the other for commercial marketing. To obtain accurate statistics in the case of the first class is impossible. Even for the second class the figures are notoriously inaccurate and fragmentary. The latest published crop reports are for 1918; but that year, owing to drought, revolutionary conditions, and various other factors, the yield of most products was abnormally low. The present administration is wisely undertaking a new land census, which from almost every angle promises to be the most comprehensive and accurate survey of agricultural conditions ever made in the republic.

For convenience's sake Mexican land products may be divided into five groups, namely, agricultural products, livestock, fruits, vegetables, and woods. In the year 1903, in which the crop yield was normal, these had the following officially estimated values:

The great staples of Mexican agricultural products are corn, sugar cane, henequen, wheat, maguey liquors, beans of various kinds, cotton, coffee, barley, peppers, tobacco, peas, rice, and cocoa. In addition, there are at least fifty minor products of which only incidental mention is possible.

CEREALS

Corn constitutes the main food supply of the nation and is grown to a greater or less degree in every section of the republic. In importance it outranks every other agricultural product. The chief corn producing states in order named are Jalisco, Guanajuato, San Luis Potosí, Guerrero, Michoacán, and Vera Cruz. Two crops a year are possible in most sections of the country, but the lack of scientific care and unfavorable climatic conditions frequently reduce the yield so far below normal that widespread distress occurs among the poorer classes. Even under the most favorable conditions Mexico is not self-sufficing in her production. of foodstuffs. The average yield of corn is less than 100,000,000 bushels a year, or six bushels per capita. At least 155,000,000 bushels are required for domestic needs.

Wheat: The raising of wheat in Mexico is much more localized than the cultivation of corn. The area best adapted to the cereal lies from 6,000 to 9,000 feet above sea-level and comprises some 50,000 square miles of the great central plateau. The chief wheat producing states are Michoacán, Guanajuato, Coahuila, Puebla, Sonora, Mexico, Durango, and Chihuahua. The production of wheat averages less than one-sixth the production of corn and is never sufficient for domestic needs. A considerable quantity is therefore imported each year from the United States. The average yield is below one bushel per capita.

Barley is produced in commercial quantities in ten states, five of which furnish nearly 88 per cent of the entire yield. These are Mexico, Puebla, Hidalgo, Zacatecas, and Michoacán. The average yield is approximately 8,000,000 bushels.

Rice: Morelos, Michoacán, and Puebla are credited with over 70 per cent of the entire rice crop of the republic. Colima, Vera Cruz, Tepic, and Tabasco come next in order named. The cereal is cultivated chiefly on restricted areas of river bottom lands which are subject to flood during certain seasons. The average yield is nearly 30,000 tons.

Oats and Rye are grown on a small scale in a few of the central plateau states and in Lower California and Vera Cruz. The combined output, however, is insignificant.

SUGAR CANE

Sugar Cane is grown in all but three states of the republic but the chief production comes from Morelos, Vera Cruz, Sinaloa, Nuevo León, Michoacán, and Puebla. The normal yield of lowland tropical fields is between forty and sixty tons to the acre; at higher elevations, where irrigation is necessary, the average is from twenty-five to fifty tons. The total annual output normally amounts to about 2,000,000 tons.

Sugar: The cane is chieflly used in the manufacture of sugar, molasses, panocha and alcohol. Many of the plantations cover thousands of acres, and are equipped with modern sugar mills having a daily capacity of 250 to 1000 tons. The normal sugar output, most of which goes for domestic consumption, amounts to 90,000 or 100,000 tons.

Panocha, a coarse brown sugar, is seldom exported, but furnishes a staple article of diet for the poorer classes. It is one of the oldest of Mexican agricultural products. The normal production is between 70,000 and 80,000 tons. Syrup and molasses, by-products of the sugar industry, have an annual output of about 70,000 tons.

Cane Alcohol, which together with maguey liquors constitutes over 90 per cent of the alcoholic products of the country, is manufactured on a large scale. In recent years the tendency of the sugar growers has been more and more to convert the cane into alcohol rather than into sugar. Between 20,000,000 and 25,000,000 gallons are produced yearly.

LEGUMES

Haba (broad beans) are produced chiefly in Michoacán, about two-thirds of the total crop coming from that state, with Mexico and Puebla ranking next in order of importance. The annual yield is in the neighborhood of 1,500,000 bushels.

Frijoles, the beans of universal consumption, are grown in every state in the republic. Together with corn they furnish the staple diet of the population. The annual production in round. numbers is 5,000,000 bushels, of which Jalisco, Guanajuato, Pueble, Vera Cruz, Zacatecas, San Luis Potosí, Michoacán and Durango furnish over 55 per cent.

Arvejón, or vetch, is grown chiefly in Puebla and Michoacán. The annual yield is about 2,000,000 bushels.

Garbanzos, or chick peas, are grown chiefly along the west coast and in Jalisco, Michoacán and Guanajuato. A large part of the crop, especially that raised in Sinaloa and Sonora, is exported to South America, Spain and Italy. The annual production exceeds 75,000 tons.

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Two years later, on December 14, 1910, Congress enacted a law on the enjoyment of waters under federal jurisdiction.

A full chapter regulates in detail the granting of charters. Preference in the use of waters subject to federal jurisdiction is laid down as follows: (1) Domestic purposes; (2) Public service in connection with towns; (3) Irrigation; (4) Water power; (5) Other industrial uses.

In keeping with the policy of greater stringency in the granting of franchises, we find that the right to enjoy waters under federal jurisdiction is limited in the case of corporations to "companies organized under the laws of Mexico, and to Mexican corporations, public or private, provided they have legal capacity to acquire such franchises"; no limitation is placed on individuals. More rigid, too, are the grounds for forfeiture. For the first time there appears in such clauses the provision that "the suspension of the work of construction for three consecutive months or for an aggregate of three months in the year without the consent of the department of Fomento" shall be cause for action by the executive. A clear distinction is made, in the length of the term of enjoyment, between franchises for irrigation or power purposes connected with an agricultural undertaking and those of a public utility character; the former are granted for an indefinite period, while the latter vary between twenty and ninetynine years. This second type of franchise is further regulated by the provision that, in cases where the term is less than sixty years, the government may acquire the whole property at a price to be fixed by experts; and, in cases where it exceeds sixty years, "all hydraulic works and such appurtenances as are defined as immovables by the civil code of the Federal District shall revert, on the expiration of the franchise, to the nation, which shall not be bound to pay any compensation therefor." Property not classified as immovable may be acquired at a fair valuation.

Water franchises fall into three main divisions: (1) Irrigation: (2) Industrial uses; (3) Appropriation, that is to say, where the water is to be used for either of the two foregoing uses on the property of the applicant.

A water concession granted in 1893 well illustrates this class of grants.

The concessionaire was authorized to build a main irrigation canal, and other subsidiary canals, and to build deposits or reservoirs to collect the torrential waters. Excavation work on the main canal was to be begun four months after approval of the plans by the department of Fomento, and not less than forty kilometers completed within four years. Provision was made for the class of material to be used; for the building of a bridge whenever any of the canals crossed a highway; for the supervision of the work by a government inspector whose compensation was to be borne by the concessionaire; for payment at the regular sched

ule of rates of all national lands occupied; for condemnation of private lands, subject to due compensation, and under carefully devised rules. The concessionaire enjoyed the free importation privilege for five years, as also the tax exemptions usually accorded in such cases. The rates to be charged for water were to be subject to the approval of the Department of Fomento.

The adoption of the constitution of 1917 made radical changes in the subject of waters. It vests in the nation the ownership of virtually all waters, including even "waters extracted from mines," which by all former legislation had belonged to the owner of the mine. But the most startling innovation appears in the precept that "the enjoyment of waters which pass from one landed property to another shall be considered of public utility, and shall be subject to the provisions prescribed by the states." It is too early yet to determine what will be the effect of this legislation, but one certain result will be to disturb legitimately acquired rights and interests of long standing.

Banking: The constitution of 1857 contained only a general reference to the power of Congress to enact commercial legislation. Accordingly, on December 14, 1883, a constitutional amendment paved the way for the Commercial Code of April 15, 1884, which contained salutary restrictions on banking. The most important was the provision that "for the establishment of banks of any kind, the authorization of the federal government is neces

sary.

The Commercial Code of 1884 was repealed by that of September 15, 1889. Unfortunately, the wise precepts on banking contained in the old code were omitted from the new, with the result that the same phenomenon that took place in railroads was repeated in banks. Charters were given "right and left for the establishment of local banks in states of the union, without any attempt at uniformity."

This matter continued until Congress on June 3, 1896, authorized the Executive to issue a general banking law. Franchises were to be given subject to certain conditions, of which only the more important are here enumerated: (1) Deposit of bonds of the public debt; (2) Minimum capital stock of 500,000 pesos, of which one-half must be paid up in cash before operations are begun; (3) Note issues never to be greater than three times the paid-up capital stock; (4) Cash balance never to fall below one-half of the value of the notes; (5) Notes to have a voluntary circulation; (6) Only the first bank to be established in any state to enjoy tax exemptions; (7) No new franchise to be given until after the enactment of the new banking law. In addition, the executive was empowered to make equitable arrangements with the Banco Nacional regarding its charter.

Negotiations were soon opened with this institution "with a view to modifying its charter in such terms as to remove all doubt