Annual report of the Department of Agriculture for the year ending 30th June, 1888.

I have the honour to report on the working of the Department of the Agriculture during the six months of the present year ending on the 30th June, 1888, including the Annual Report of the Colonial Botanist.
This Department, although gazetted in July of last year, has only practically been in operation since the beginning of the present year, in consequence of my visit to the Southern Colonies and New Zealand, to inquire into the working of kindred departments in those colonies, and also the village settlement scheme in vogue in New Zealand, my report thereon being laid before Parliament at the close of last session.
The groundwork of this Department being, in my opinion, to watch over and assist in every way possible the interests and well-being of an industrial class more numerous than any other, and upon whose labour depends the very existence and prosperity of the human family, and knowing that the area of land available for agriculture in this colony is unsurpassed both in fertility and area, so that agriculturists by the thousand can find here a farm and a home, it will be the constant aim of this Department to aid and assist the agriculturists of Queensland, both by the dissemination of practical information and seeds, and also by the testing of new, rare, and untried plants of other colonies and countries that promise to prove of commercial value to this colony.
As will be seen from the schedule marked B, appended to this Report, which shows what seeds have been distributed up to the present date, a beginning, though without doubt a small one, has been made, but which I hope is only the forerunner of very greatly extended operations in the interests of agriculture generally.
Up to the present time the work of this Department has been confined to -
1. The inspection of resumed halves of runs, with reference to the suitability of the land or any part of it for agriculture, and the procuring of samples of soil for exhibition in the office of this Department.
2. Procuring and distributing seeds of new plants of commercial value to bona fide planters and farmers, care being taken to ascertain through the local Land Agents as to whether the applicants for seeds are really farming the land.
3. Obtaining and supplying information to intending selectors as to where good laud is situated, quality thereof, means of access, distance from a market, &c.
4. Initiating correspondence with kindred departments in other parts of the world, so that advantage may be taken of their experience in any matters that may prove of value to this colony.
PETER McLEAN, Under Secretary for Agriculture.
Brisbane, May 19th, 1888.