ABSTRACT
The evidence to which the author turns is from the recent monumental study by B. H. Slicher Van Bath, The Agrarian History of Western Europe A.D. 500 to 1830 [1963]. There is the widely held belief that farmers during ages past were bound by cultural factors so formidable that there was little or no room for economic progress. The general view is that farmers during these many decades were unbelievably slow in taking advantage of the economic opportunity afforded them by such new products or new inputs. The chapter describes new farm products and new inputs. The products that qualify are potato, sugar beet, maize, flax, and madder— not an exhaustive list. As a source of sugar, the real comparative advantage still belongs to sugar cane, the production of which is concentrated between the temperate and tropic zones.
