An Act Creating a Bureau of Agriculture

October 8, 1901

ACT NO. 261

AN ACT CREATING A BUREAU OF AGRICULTURE

SECTION 1. There is hereby created, under the Department of the Interior, an Insular Bureau of Agriculture, which shall conduct investigations and disseminate useful information with reference to the agricultural resources of the Philippine Islands, the methods of cultivation at present in vogue and their improvement, the practicability of introducing new and valuable agricultural products, the introduction of new domesticated animals, and the improvement of the breeds of domesticated animals now found in the Islands; and shall, in general, seek to promote the development of the agricultural resources of the Archipelago. The Bureau shall take charge of and shall conduct the Government farms at Magalang, in the Province of Pampanga, and at La Carlota, in the Province of Occidental Negros, and of the Government Agricultural Experiment Stations in the Provinces of Iloilo, Cebu, Isabela, Ilocos, and Albay.

SECTION 2. There shall be a Chief of the Insular Bureau of Agriculture, who shall receive a salary of four thousand dollars per year, payable monthly, in money of the United States.

SECTION 3. The Chief of the Insular Bureau of Agriculture shall, after due consideration, submit to the Philippine Commission a plan for the organization of the Bureau, framed as nearly as may be after the organization of the Department of Agriculture of the United States, with such variations as may be required by the different conditions in the two countries and the provisions of Act Numbered One hundred and fifty-six, entitled "An Act providing for the establishment of Government Laboratories for the Philippine Islands." He shall have general supervision and control over the work of the Bureau, and shall appoint its subordinate officers and employees, subject to the provisions of the Civil Service Act and of Act Numbered Twenty-five. He shall discharge all such other duties in connection with the work of the Bureau as may be assigned to him by the Secretary of the Interior.

SECTION 4. The public good requiring the speedy enactment of this bill, the passage of the same is hereby expedited in accordance with section two of "An Act prescribing the order of procedure by the Commission in the enactment of laws, passed September twenty-sixth, nineteen hundred.

SECTION 5. This Act shall take effect on its passage.

ENACTED, October 8, 1901.