Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1920-05-25
MEREDITH APPEALS
To CITIES To SEND
LABOR To FARMS
Secretary Of Agriculture
Stresses Danger of Food
Shortage and Urges
Emergency Action at Once
(The Atlanta journal News Bureau,
623 Riggs Building.)
BY THEODORE TILLER

an exclusive and authorized inter-
view here today the secretary of ag-
riculture, Edwin T. Meredith, ex-
pressed the. fear of a serious food
scarcity next winter and urged that
city folks aid the farmer to harvest
his crops.
Secretary Meredith revealed that
he is sending to secretaries of var
ious business organization through
out the country an dto presidents of
colleges and universities, letters
urging them to cooperate in the
movement to get labor out to the
farms to assist in production and
harvesting.
Secretary Meredith said the Amer
lean farmer is today handicapped by
various circumstances over which he
has no control. What effect this will
have on production, coupled with
recent drop in prices with additional
encouragement the secretary is not
prepared to say, but he did comment
frankly on the danger of a food
shortage and the necessity of city
residents giving some thought tol the
cOnQ1I1OnS on the farms.
This problem" he said, lis as
much the city mans as it is the
farmers. Their interest are mex
tricably bound up and interdepen-
dent. I often wonder if the people
of the cities realize how closely the
problem comes home to them. With
the exception of the packing centers,
oil Of N
hand at any one time only enough
meat to feed them for perhaps four
days.
Supplies Limited
They have only enough -four to
last a few weeks. Their vegetables
and fr.its come in from day to-day.
Practically everything they eat is
only a few days, or at most a few
weeks, removed from the farm.
Whenever there is a shortage of pro-
1ected on the people Of, the cities--.7,7-
ss7'"'$C drfaffed acrea ge necessarily
means curtaiIed food production, and
without adequate labor farmers can
not maintain adequate acreage. Not
alone is there a shortage of thirty
per cent in the supply of hired farm
labor, the country over, but farm
work is greatly behind because of the
backward spring.
Even with the best possible sea-
son from now until harvest, these
two things, shortage of labor, and
late spring, mean reduced produc-
ton. With poor season from now
on a food scarcity is inevitable, and
prosperity everywhere. High wages
would near little to the city worker
if he cannot buy food except at fam
inc prices.
'"rhe curtailment of emigration
alone during the war has been sUf-
ficient to make a deep cut in the
normal supply of labor of all kinds.
With what labor supply there is, the
farmer feels he is unable to compete
with the higher paying industries of
the cities. If he is to get the help
he needs this summer. he must rely
on a thorough awakening on the part
of the city people to their responsi-
bilities in the situation. They have
got to realize as far as agricultural
production is concerned that an emer-
gency faces the country as grave in
many respects as that which faced us
during the war and calling for the
same degree Of patriotic response.
War Situation
During the war city residents
showed what they could do to help
farm labor exactly corresponds in
figures and in fact with the short
age which existed in the summer of
1918 Yet exceptionally large crops
were produced that year. Why? In
the first place because the individual
farmer gave every ounce of his en-
ergy to the patriotic duty of seeing
that the country at war did not lack
for food. Old retired and sometimes
crippled farmers, with their wives,
went into the field to help. But i'm
portant also was the fact that large
numbers Of business men, students
and workers in the city responded to
the appeal that they spend a part
or all of their vacation in the fields
helping the farmers. Only by SINH
lar cooperation can We meet the
present emergency in the agricul-
tural situation. Will the city folks
respond?"
The secretary said he would not
predict what the present break in
food prices, particularly in the grain
market, is going to mean to the
farmer, nor could he estimate wheth-
er this break is to mean most ex-
pense to the food spectators Or the
farmers. He said, however, that the
farmer was forced to weigh the
doubtful prospects as to future
prices for his products, when. on
the opposite sheet of his ledger he
notes the nigh prices he must still
pay for labor, equipment, seed, fer
tilizer and other supplies, as we'll as
for the land he tills.
Writing to business men and col
lege presidents in the interest of city
aid for the farmer, Secretary Mere
dith will point out that while of
course the inexperienced farm hand
cannot expect to receive as much as
the worker with farm experience,
practically all men and boys who are
adaptable to the work should be able
quickly to earn good wages in the
harvest fields.
Altogether the secretary's au-
thorized interview presents a rather
serious resume of farm conditions
, and holds I'D for public inspection
and action the danger of a food
shortage that may pinch the nation
next winter.