Scotsman Archive

IT IS impossible to lift Scotland's huge post-war potato harvest without the aid of over 50,000 school children. That is one of the main conclusions of the Committee on Harvest Labour, who issued their report after 14 months of examination of the most acute problem which faces Scottish farmers implementing the government's programme for expansion of home-produced food. The committee think there will be sufficient labour for the 1950 grain harvest provided recent schemes are maintained, and on the subject of the much more serious problem of the heavy potato crop which has to be lifted they have come to the conclusion that if the aid of school children ceased, the ingathering of the crop will be seriously prejudiced and might result in the loss of a substantial part of it. The report was discussed at a Press conference in St Andrew's House, Edinburgh, by Mr Hector McNeil, the Secretary of State for Scotland.