The Washington times., 1914-12-12
THE MEAT SUPPLIES.

Secretary of Agriculture Houston
chose a good time to suggest to the
South that it ought to contribute
more to the nations supplies of food
stuffs. Rather, that it ought by all
means to produce the foodstuffs 1t
consumes. It has the land, now I'M
used, and under a proper system of
crop management and rotation it
could, with its present supplies of
labor, produce a great deal more and
a wider variety of food products.
The South has known cotton rails
ing for generations, and before the
war it knew a good deal about
stock. But the war deprived 1t of
its stock, and of the resources with
which to replace it. About the only
thing that remained in its place was
the land and the labor; and the world
was pitifully short of cotton. So nat
urally enough all energies were
turned to the production of cotton,
and cotton became as never before
the country's great staple. It has
had its ups and its downs; but in
recent years chiefly its ups, so that
there was no great incentive to di-
versify. Sixteen million bales, per-
haps nearer seventeen million, rep
resent the 1914 outturn; and 1t
would have sold at a good price if
there had been no war. Why go into
experiments with livestock, the cat
tie tick, silos, and other things that
the South's labor does not know,
when cotton is doing so well?
That was the natural enough stti-
tude of Southern agriculture. But
the war has compelled consideration
of other aspects. There must be di-
versifcation, if the South shall get
the foodstuffs it will need during
the war. In the past cotton could
be sold for cash with which to buy
what the South did not raise; but
when the cotton cannot be turned in
to cash, those necessaries must be
had in some other way; and raising
them seems a very obvious method
in a country in which it is estimated
that more than 20 per cent Of the
arabic land is not producing any
thing.
To what extent the South has been
an importer of the things it could
have produced, is suggested by Sec
rotary Houston thus:
No Southern State Is giving sufficient
attention to the production OF food
sturfs. either for human beings or for
live stock. A conservative estimate in
dicates that Texas imports from other
States annually more than O,0O0 90
worth of wheat. corn and oats; Georgia
more than 100000. Twelve Southern
States import more than s175. Oh, 900
worth of these three commodities. ana
81. 900. 900 worth OF meats, dairy and
poultry products
Secretary Houston says that II farm
ers in the South had heretofore prac-
ticed diversification an a sufficiently
large scale, producing their own home
supplies, that section would not be IN
its present hard case"
Cotton is going to remain the
great staple of the South. No mat
ter If Mr.. Houston's advice Is acted
upon, the fact remains that cotton
will continue its most important
crop. If the present war lasts two
or three years, it will compel the
world to accumulate a great def
cheney in cotton; and the impetus
which the civil wars ending gave to
cotton production will be repeated.
The best hope for the South's agri-
cultural future lies In the chance
that that section may realize the
possibility of getting better and
more varied results through better
rotation; through planting corn and
oats, and grasses, as well as cotton;
through raising wheat in those con-
siderable sections adaptable to
wheat: and particularly, through
making each farm a center for pro-
duction o. side line of livestock, as
is done throughout the North and
West. It is true that the range
country's possibilities as headquar-
tiers for the primary production Of
meat supplies have been pretty
largely exhausted, because the
ranges are disappearing. That means
that smaller quantities of stock must
IN future be raised, fattened, and fin
ished on the small farm. The South
is in position to learn this lesson
just as well as some other sections
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