E.F. Schumacher is best remembered for his 1973 book Small is Beautiful which is subtitled A Study of Economics as if People Mattered. Not as well remembered, or even known are his other books. A Guide for the Perplexed, which is without a subtitle, was published in 1977. Twenty years after that, he wrote This I Believe, which has a title extension, "and other essays." Somewhere in between he wrote and published a book titled Good Work. In 1981 he wrote in the Foreword of his friend and colleague’s book Small is Possible: A factual account about who is doing what, where, to put into practice the ideas expressed in E.F. Shumacher’s Small is Beautiful, "Many years of work on these matters have completely convinced me not only that small is beautiful but also that small is possible and has the future on its side." Time will tell whether that prediction is right or wrong.

Probably near twenty five years ago I heard George McRobie speak here on spud island. Back then a two row potato harvester was probably the biggest potato harvester on P.E.I. At that time there were probably few windrowers that allowed a two row harvester to pick up more than just the two rows it was lifting. Now, picking up four or more rows of potatoes is the norm. There is now at least one gigantic potato harvester that can lift twenty rows at a pass.

When we moved to P.E.I. in 1962, I was eleven years old, soon to turn twelve, and the rural schools closed for the potato harvest. In Brudenell at least, the beater digger was the only type of potato digger used in 1962. The potatoes were then picked up by hand into potato baskets which were emptied into dump carts pulled by a horse and emptied into house cellars or potato warehouses such as they were at that time. But things were beginning to change. Probably by the mid-1960s there was the first one row digger in Brudenell. It had a low platform on back to bag the harvested potatoes and let the bags fall to the ground to be picked up later.

I don’t know exactly what year Emmet Power, from Greenfield, started using a two row digger with a boom to load trucks running alongside. I do know that Francis Rudisch has an old Fordson Major that is maybe six inches longer that the standard factory model. That near fifty horsepower tractor used to belong to the Powers. The extra few inches are occupied by gearing to allow lower gearing than normal for the harvesting of potatoes. Probably by the mid 1960s or not long after, the Powers bought an 806 International. And the talk for miles around was "$10,000 for a tractor!" That tractor was near one hundred horsepower.

Back then I was really quite impressed with all the developments taking place. Bigger tractors, more gears, power steering, independent PTOs rather than just a two stage clutch. Our B-275 International had 32 horsepower and only eight gears, which wasn’t really enough, but even that was three more gears than the tractor we had in Ontario. We later bought our first used Farmall 200 with front mounted cultivators, mainly for row crop work in vegetables and tobacco, and it had only four forward gears. We paid $800 for it back about ’69 or ’70, which was half of its original cost to Frank Butler from Peter’s Road.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And the talk for miles around was "$10,000 for a tractor!"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The 806 the Powers had bought had 16 gears, as did our 966 International years later. Our 574 Internationals later also had 16 speeds but the main transmission was synchronized and that to my mind was an impressive improvement. Since I quit farming more than twenty years ago, power shift transmissions have become quite popular and those transmissions are more impressive yet. But when I heard from a farmer that the power shift option for a 175 horsepower John Deere was a $5,700 option, that didn’t sound so great.

A recent issue of Acres U.SA. quoted someone supposedly in the know as stating that unless a farmer has a $350,000 tractor, he isn’t a real farmer. But maybe the more important issue isn’t setting a numerical criteria as to what makes a farmer real, but rather what constitutes real development and real progress.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The most obvious facts are the most easily forgotten. – R.H. Tawney (1880-1962)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Backtracking a bit, Verena Schumacher, the wife of E.F., started the Foreword of McRobie’s Small is Possible by noting that, "It was in 1955 that my husband first became interested in the problems of the developing countries. For six months he was seconded from his work at the National Coal Board, on the initiative of the United Nations, to be Economic Advisor to the Government of Burma – an experience that influenced him deeply."

Further on she stated that, "Most of his economist friends laughed at his low-cost small-scale development ideas. Governments of the countries he advised paid only lip-service to his counsels. The industrialists, and most official development agencies, were interested only in selling the latest and most sophisticated hardware to the poor countries."

She continued from there by letting the readers know, "But he found a friend who was willing to learn from him in George McRobie . . . Their conviction that the problems of poor countries could not be met by the ‘marvels’ of Western technology led the two of them, along with Julia Porter, to set up the Intermediate Technology Development Group in 1965. Together they set themselves the task of helping people to help themselves."

Early in the first chapter of McRobie’s book, he wrote, "Our institutions are swarming with people who are wringing their hands about the overwhelming power of multinational companies. And at the same time applauding the technological development which makes production so complex and so colossally costly that only the multinational companies can carry it. This is the predicament not only of the developing countries but also of our own countries now. The middle way, which is also the democratic way that gives the little people some independence . . . There is little point in attacking the multinationals when the whole of society is bumbling along led by engineers and scientists who then introduce another complication, another speeding up. Well, that is their job. But we as a society have not got enough philosophy or humanity to call a stop when a stop is indicated. Or at least to try and counterbalance it."

At this point, getting close to where this column needs to end, it is difficult to decide what best to write or quote next. One thing is certain, not everything that appears progressive yields wholistic progress and wholistic development.

Maybe the best food for thought can come from the first of the two quotes E.F. Schumacher used to preface his first book Small is Beautiful: "Few can contemplate without a sense of exhilaration the splendid achievements of practical energy and technical skill, which, from the latter part of the seventeenth century, were transforming the face of material civilization, and of which England was the daring, if not too scrupulous, pioneer. If, however, economic ambitions are good servants, they are bad masters. // The most obvious facts are the most easily forgotten. Both the existing economic order and too many of the projects advanced for reconstructing it break down through their neglect of the truism that, since even quite common men have souls, no increase in material wealth will compensate them for arrangements which insult their self-respect and impair their freedom. A reasonable estimate of economic organization must allow for the fact that, unless industry is to be paralyzed by recurrent revolts on the part of outraged human nature, it must satisfy criteria which are not purely economic." Those quoted words are from R.H. Tawney’s book Religion and the Rise of Capitalism. Tawney lived from 1880 to 1962.

A wikipedia search regarding Tawney revealed among other things that World War I caused him "to grapple with the nature of Original sin" and that "The goodness we have reached is a house built on piles driven into black slime and always slipping down into it unless we are building night and day." That entry added that his grappling, "also heightened his sense of urgency for meaningful social, economic and political change."

Yes, the two stage clutch was a big improvement over what was before, and yes power steering was a big improvement over muscle powered steering especially in the bigger tractors, but will auto-steer take us to "meaningful social, economic and political change," or contribute to taking us even further from it?

An alternative closing paragraph might be: At this time of upheaval it might be a very good time to see if the ladders of supposed progress and development are resting upon the most stable of piles. and also to check out to see if the ladders are leaning up against the right walls to help deliver "meaningful social, economic and political change."