The Saint Paul globe., 1897-10-23
SIBERIA AND WHEAT.

SIBERIA AND WHEAT.
The country was informed, last July,
that the secretary of agriculture had
''sent a special secret commission
abroad to investigate the possibility of
Siberia becoming the great wheat pro-
ducing country of the world" This was
but another Of the several junkets
which this administration and especial
ly it's department of agriculture, has
provided for sundry gentlemen who
would like to make tours of foreign
countries, but preferred that the ex-
penses be borne by other pockets than
their own. The "bimetallic" commits
sion that has just received so polite
and diplomatic but decisive rebuff
from the one government upon whose
assent it's mission, if it had one, de-
pended is one Illustration. The little
party of distinguished agriculturists
that went to Alaska to see what could
be raised there in the way of farm
products is another. There is just as
much need of one as the other and none
of any. Consul Heenan, at Odessa, if
our ambassadors, consuls general and
other representatives in Russia could
not find out all there is to be known
of the resources of Siberia, could have
made another tour Of exploration, and
wait again for his pay as he now awaits
reimbursement for a former one.
We have, however, a source of infor-
nation that is rather better than will
be the Investigations Of this secret
commission" the secretary has sent out,
in Prince Krapotkin, of Russia, now on
a visit to this continent. He writes to
the New York Evening Post that, dur
ing his trip through Canada, he had
been repeatedly asked as to the wheat
production of the great interior Of ST.
IBERIA, soon to be opened by the COM
pletion of the transcontinental road He
says that there are vast portions of
Siberia where wheat and rye can be
grown to the same extent as in Dakota
and Manitoba. While this is so it is
also true that there are vast regions
where they cannot be grown, with 9TH
ers where mining is now, and in the
future will be far more the chief occu-
patton. OF these latter there are
four, the Altai, the Yeneseisk, the
Transbaikalai and the Amur regions. In
addition the Middle Urals and the Kir-
ghiz steppe depend entirely upon the
for their breadstuffs, while elsewhere
there are more than half a million ma
tives who already consume more bread
stuffs than they can possibly raise.
Altogether" he says, 'ft appears
from very careful modern researches
that the grain exporting resources of
the Russian empire have been very
much exaggerated. The considerable
quantities of grain which are exported
at the present time do not represent a
corresponding surplus Of production
over and above the needs of the popu-
latfon; and the latest researches tend
to prove more and more that the year
ly consumption of wheat and rye per
head of population in Russia would no
more than equal the annual consump-
tion of wheat per head in Western Eu-
rope if no wheat and rye were exported
and the total crop of these two cereals
were consumed in Russia itself" This
should dispose of this bugaboo for
some years to come, and the secretary
might as we'll cable his secret commits
sion to come home. Should it develop,
in the years following the completion of
the Siberian road, that Prince Krapot-
kin is mistaken, and that Siberia is the
future granary Of the world, there is
no cause in it for uneasiness. Before
that time comes the processes of agri-
cultural progress, that have made
wheat the pioneer crop with us, to be
later displaced by other products,
movement that, in half a century, has
moved the wheat belt from New York
to Dakota, will have made that cereal
subordinate product here and trans
ferred its kingdom to the provinces
Of the dominion lying to the north Of
Manitoba. One has only to note how
rapidly, within twenty years, cattle,
hogs and dairying have crowded wheat
growing, as the main dependence, from
the southern counties of this state to
the northwestern, to realize how mi
gratory the wheat supremacy is and
how little figure it has come to cut in
our farming.