Agricultural production
Most scholars seem to agree that per capita production of vegetable products (mostly grain) increased rapidly during the first half of the nineteenth century. As early as the second half of the eighteenth century there were several indications of a new and positive development of Swedish agriculture, the most notable being the beginning of the enclosure movement.
However, it was not until the first decades of the nineteenth century that the process of agricultural transformation gained speed with more rapid and universal enclosures, new crops, crop rotations, improved tools, and land reclamation (e.g Heckscher 1949; Utterstrom 1957; Martinius 1982; Magnusson 1996; Gadd 2000; Schon 2000). Most scholars also seem to agree that both agricultural production and productivity, at least in terms of increased production per worker employed in agriculture, increased as a result of these changes. Judging mainly from various indirect evidence on consumption and foreign trade, Utterstrom believed production of vegetable products to have doubled between 1815 and 1860, while population increased by only 60% (Utterstrom 1957: 700). Also using information on exports of agricultural products, and making assumptions regarding the development of domestic consumption, Martinius estimated that labour productivity in agriculture increased by 0.6-0.9% annually between the 1830s and 1860 (Martinius 1970: 168-74). One important novelty in this regard was the increased cultivation of potatoes in Sweden, as well as in other parts of Europe, during this period. Potato cultivation together with increased usage of iron tools were important factors in overcoming diminishing returns on the newly reclaimed land (Gadd 1983; see also Schon 2000). In the Historical National Accounts of Sweden, Schon (1995) also presents a similar picture: starting in the 1820s production per capita of both vegetable and animal products increased rapidly, but it stagnated during the 1830s and the 1840s. In the late 1840s, agricultural production per capita showed a rising trend, and the increase was rapid in the 1850s. In Scandia in particular, this agricultural development was paralleled by increased exports of grain (e.g Fridlizius 1981) and urbanization (Bengtsson 1990: 186-7), two indicators of economic growth.Thus, there seems to have been a pronounced positive economic development in the agricultural sector at least from the first decade of the nineteenth century. This, however, does not tell us very much about the development of standard of living in various social groups. To do that, we need more information on the distribution of the increased product among the various social groups.
2.2