The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1918-06-18
Food Situation in Central Europe

A detailed survey of the food situation in
German, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and Turkey
during 1917 has just been published by the
Bureau of Labor Statistics Of the U. S. Depart
ment of Labor This survey is based exclusively
on laws, DEGREES, orders utterances of public Of
ficias and civic bodies of the countries covered,
and on comments of the daily press and leading
economic and trade journals of these countries.
A digest of the bulletin says:
''In general, the survey shows that Turkey is
actually starving because of the corruption of
her own officials and the greed Of Germany; that
Germany and Austria are not starving, but are
having a very hard struggle to feed themselves
that Hungary is in better shape than either Ger
many or Austria and that Bulgaria so far as food
is concerned is suffering the least of all the
tries covered. The survey also shows that Ger
many has failed by wide margin to live up to
her reputation for efficiency in her attempts at
food administration, having been obliged to re-
verse her policies in an effort to remedy in part
the fatal results of official blunders. 1t shows
concusivey that the civil populations of Ger
many and Austria are suffering permanent
physical deterioration from lack of proper food
that the death rate from tuberculosis is rapidly
increasing, that growing boys and girls are not
getting half the nourishment they should have,
and that manual laborers are being underfed to
about the same extent.
Politically, the most interesting thing re-
vealed by the survey is the fact that the ira
ditional hatred between the two parts of the dual
monarchy Austria-Hungary has been manifest
ing itself in the refusal of Hungary to share her
comparative abundance with Austria and in the
official and public resentment of that fact in the
latter country.
"Profiteering, greed, breakdown of transpor-
tation, and faulty organization big factors in
the food situation of Germany and her allies
MANY original articles on the food situation
in leading German and Austrian newspapers
were at the disposal of the Bureau of Labor Sta
tistics Comments on food orders, their enforce
ment, and the practical result of their applica-
ticn were available from organs of all political
parties, thus representing every point of view.
Material relating to the food situation in Hun
gary, Bulgaria, and Turkey was much scarcer
Those parts of the bulletin which cover the food
situation in these three countries are therefore
less comprehensive than the parts covering Ger
many and Austria. AS far as it was possible the
material for each country covered was arranged
in the following order: First, an official or un-
official summary of the food situation in 1917, or
both; this is followed by an outline of the food
policy for the 1918 harvest reports, food orders
relating to individual foodstuffs, comments on
and criticism of these orders and their practical
application, data on the supply and prices of in
dividual foodstuffs and their rationing, illegal
procuring of food, food-card systems, measures
for cheapening the food for the poorer classes,