Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries and Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and...

Papers of successive Education and Advisory divisions of the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries and the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food dealing with the headquarters administration of the National Agricultural Advisory Service's Experimental Husbandry Farms and Horticulture Stations, and its Horticulture Demonstration Stations. Files dealing with acquisition of property usually contain maps or plans.

Early files in this series often contain re-registered papers, mostly from the RG (MAF 117) and TPB series: MAF 33

For further records on horticulture see

from 2005 Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

from 1971 Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food

Topics

Maps and plans

Food and drink

Fishing

Farming

These farms and stations were acquired by the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries, from 1946 onwards, in connection with the establishment of the National Agricultural Advisory Service (NAAS). Sites were either purchased or rented from county councils, which had previously administered them through the County War Agricultural Executive Committees. A committee of the Agricultural Improvement Council of England and Wales, the Experimental Husbandry or Horticulture Committee, examined each site before a decision was reached that NAAS should take over its administration. The committees aimed to have a broad selection of sites that reflected varying farming and growing conditions and soil types across England and Wales, so allowing NAAS to give authoritative advice in most situations.