Le Nord : revue internationale des Pays de Nord - 01.06.1944, Síða 213

FARMING IN ICELAND
191
with the requirements of society, but the settler is a freeholder
from the very beginning.
State aid is given only on condition that the Government
determines the direction of the production, and imposes on the
farmers to keep annual accounts on a form prescribed by the
Board, through which this is informed of the state of affairs of
the farm.
Sale and closing down is to be sanctioned by the Board, and
the selling price must never exceed the assessment for the tax on
real property. The aid granted by the State is not to be repaid,
but in the event of sale of the farm it is to be deducted from the
tax on real property. As long as the settler is running his farm,
he enjoys in full the advantages of the capital invested in it by
the State, which must not in any way be encumbered, but when
on death or sale he leaves the farm, he cannot obtain any private
profit beyond what he has himself spent on his farm.
A maximum limit for the State aid to the individual farm
has been established, and this must not exceed ^ of the cost of
foundation. Further the settlers may raise loans for 50 years
without interest in the settlers’ department of the Rural Bank,
which are paid back by 2 per cent. annual instalments. The
owners of the farms have to pay 1 per cent. annually for de-
preciation of the values of the buildings, and this money forms
a fund for rebuilding, on which interest is to be paid by the
bank. Every farm or association of farms has its account in
this fund and has a claim to payment when the buildings of
the farm are to be renewed. Although on a small scale we have
here the beginnings of forced saving-up on the long view for
the purpose of securing the continued existence of agriculture.
It is a duty for the participants to form a co-operative settlers’
association, the statutes of which are to be sanctioned by the
Minister of Agriculture. The object of this is to supply land for
the establishment of more farms and to work for the performance
of tasks which the individual farmers cannot be expected to be
equal to.
What separates this legislation from that of the rest of the
Scandinavian countries within this sphere is the fact that the
settler himself owns and is absolute master of his farm. FIis
freedom has only been restricted where social considerations re-
quire this. He may freely sell or cede his farm, this being in
contrast to the Danish legislation of the 4th of October 1919,