The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1895-08-22
WHEAT ONE USES
The Average Amount Allotted to
Each Individual Per Annum.
Estimates Based Upon Crop Yield, Ex.
ports and Population for q Period
of twenty-five Years
Close Calculation.

wheat per capita in the United States
has been officially estimated at 4.67
bushels, and this quantity was used for
several years in the compilation OF
statements by the agricultural bureau
at Washington. The disagreement in
recent years between the quantities OF
wheat on haad and what they would
have been if this estimate and those for
crop production were correct has IN
v;ted a reexamination of the data.
This, says the Chicago Tribune, has
been undertaken by Mr.. B. II. Snow,
who reviewed all the official figures
availab for the determination OF the
quantity consumed. He has tabulated
the returns of actual food consumption
in 1894 families, representing s,22o IN
dividuals of stated ages, and working
at various employments IN twenty
four states. and the results are COM
pared with the census statistics OF flour
production and export, taking 4SH
pounds of -four as the average product
from bushel of wheat. He definitely
adopts ATT bushels of wheat as the av-
lerage annual consumption per capita,
which for a population OF 7O,OOO,Ooo
persons would give an aggregate an
,rnal food consumption of 334, 100000
bushels of wheat.
! To this must be added the volume OF
exports in wheat and -four and the
quantity used for seed, which varies
with the breadth sOwn. If an allow
lance of SO, DOC, 900 be made for the latter
Il 20 nno ono f,y copcnrpp&iop a c haste
ETC.. these, with the food consumption,
will make 4O0, Zoo, 900 bushels to be SUBJ
ltracted from the total crop yield, the
remainder being the export surplus,
without taking into account any wheat
that is used for the feeding OF live
stock and poultry, of which great
amount is said to have been done from
the crop Of 1904 But 400, 000, 900 di-
vided by 10000, 600 gives unit con-
sumption of about 81 bushels for all
domestic purposes, and this result IS
nearly half bushel per capita moro
than the g. 211 bushels which was stated
a few years ago to have been deduced
from a close comparison OF reported
crop yield, exports and population
through a series of twenty-five years.
This difference is not necessarily the
result of important error in either set
of figures. The long period for which an
average was taken was one during which
the per capita consumption OF wheat
must have largely increased among the
poorer people of the southern states,
who hardly knew what wheat bread
was till after the close of the war.
Probably there has been some increase
in the north, but this may not have
been more than sufficient to offset the
greater yield of -four obtainable from
wheat by modern milling as compared
with the old-fashioned grinding proc
ess And oubtedly the per capita
consumption now varies from year to
year. The excess Of milling product
over exports of flour in 1880 left per
capita Of 5. SO bushels of wheat for home
consumption, while the corresponding
result for 1890 was only 52S bushels
per capita. These figures do not take
into account the difference in -four
stocks at the two ends of the year, but
there is no evidence of any marked ac-
emulation during either of the two
years to greatly change the per capita
figures.
The one important deduction to be
made from the comparison is that what
ever error may have been made In esti-
mating quantities left over at the end
of each of a few recent crop years must
be ascribed to looseness OF the data
from which were compiled the esti-
mates of crop yield. 1t seems probable
that for each of the last three or four
crops there was An average underesti-
mate of 40, 600, 600 Or sc, 600, 600 bushels,
while there was much smaller under
estimate Of domestic consumption.