PRIMARY PRODUCTION AND MARKETING
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class, as compared with the Department's previous survey, is used as follows:
(i) Land under vegetable cultivation is now 3,615 acres as
compared with 2,254—an increase of 1,361 acres.
(ii) Land under two-crop paddy has dropped from 20,191 acres
to 19,050 a decrease of 1,141 acres.
(iii) There is an overall increase in land cultivated of about 307 acres of which 153 acres are accounted for by the extension of orchards.
(iv) About 64 acres less of field crops are now cultivated and 105 acres of abandoned land have been brought into cultivation.
Against this purely agricultural use of land must be set the demands of a predominantly urban Colony with a rapidly rising population and a basis of economy that is becoming increasingly industrial. Urban industry is now Hong Kong's largest employer and industries require land. Wherever possible, factories and urban extensions in country zones are concentrated on land reclaimed from the sea-as at Kwun Tong and Tsuen Wan-but towns such as Yuen Long, Tai Po and Sha Tin are all expanding, and it is unavoidable that in the process fields in the close vicinity of towns will be lost to agriculture; or at least that agriculture will be restricted in such areas to market gardens. The land policy of the New Territories Administration restricts the process as far as is reasonably possible, but each year's figures of agricultural acreage emphasize the struggle between the demands of town and country.
In view of the pressure of rapid industrial expansion on land requirements, more hillside land is being opened for agricultural purposes. Large areas are also required for settling people who have been assisted by various welfare organizations to take up farming. In order to have some idea of the potential agricultural value of available land, most of which is marginal, the Govern- ment is making use of the services of experts from the Colonial Pool of Soil Surveyors and the Soil Survey of the Colony is now under way.
Indispensable adjuncts to the agricultural development of neglected land are improved communications and irrigation. Here the Government has received considerable assistance from Colonial