The Birmingham age-herald., 1920-05-06
MEREDITH ON FARM OUTLOOK

Following is an interesting abstract of ar address by F. T. Meredith, Secretary of Agriculture. before the Chamber of Commerce of the United States at Allan tic City, N. J., last week:
 If all the farmers in the United States should decide to go into some other bEsi' ness-branch out, as We say-they could sell their live stock and crops for one year, and with the money they receive buy all the railroads in the United States, 4 together with all the rolling stock ana Nother equipment If they wished to go out of the farming business entirely, they could sell their farms along with their crops and live stock, and with the money they receive. buy all the railroads, all the manufacturing establishments, all the mines and all the quarries in the United States. In other words, it would be Just about an "even trade" between the farm property and all the other productive property in the United States, except the mercantile establishments. They couia with their income from live stock ana crops for a single year pay practically the entire national debt. The investment il, agriculture amounts to about $S0O5J,- o00,O00 and last year the value of crop and live stock aggregated $2ooV0'ooooO
 The business men assembled here de not need to be told that an industry O. | to the prosperity and welfare of tie country as q whole. You all realize tha' when crops are good business will he good, and when crops are poor and farm CTS are not buying other lines Of pusi nes will suffer. Think of the purcnasins power of the growers of such cash crops as cotton, wheat and tobacco which Ill 1919 had farm value of nearly $ooi,- 00OO00. or the live stock growers of the trrfi inI1l a Gf valued at more than $S00O,oo00O0- And yer l have mentioned only live stock and three out of sixty different crops.
 Not only is agriculture important to other lines of business because of the buying and consuming power of farmers and their families, but it is fundamental ly important to all the people of the United States as source of their food supply of raw materials for manufacture and because of it's contribution to the export trade of the country Few people realize that the food stocks in the larger cities at any one time are sufficient only for 8 few weeks or months at most and that, if the steady flow of farm products to the cities should be seriously interrupted for any reason, the city pop ulation would soon face starvation. Nor do many people fully realize ahat If farm production is curtaled materially, it wH~
 
 whose memories go back thirty yearL will recall the period of relative over production and low prices of farm prod ucts during the early nineties due to the bringing into cultivation of large areas of rich prairie lands of the middle west This was 8 period of low farm prices and business depression.
 In order that production may keep pace with the growing population, it will be
 
 will require that cultivation shall become more and more intensive. Intensive methods of cultivation are expensive in both labor and equipment, and such methods will not be practiced unless the prices farmers receive for their products are adequate
 It should be remembered, also, that American farmers are not only in com petition with each other as producers, but they are in competition with producers of other countries. Not only that, bat agriculture as an industry is In direct competition with other industries for capital and especially for labor. Under present conditions farmers are losing III competition for labor with other indus- tries The labor supply of the country ia short the normal immigration of labor from Europe during the war period, prob ab1v about 4000,000 During 1917 and l9ls n,anufacturing industries were largely diverted to the making of war munitions and supplies, and stocks of manuIac- tured commodities were greatly reduced Al the close of the war. therefore. there was an accumulated shortage and an increased demand for manufactured ar ticles. Manufacturing industries coulo afford to speed up to full capacity and pay increasingly higher wages, because the additional cost could be passed on to the consuming public. The extra labor required for this increased output was ob- tained largely from farms. The drift of young people from farms to tne cities had been going on at an increasing rate even prior to the war, especially in the vicinity of industrial centers. More than 100000 young farmers went into the military service. While these young farmer soldiers were fighting for their country on the battlehelds of Europe. many more laborers were iured away from the farms by the high wages ana shorter hours of city employment. When +h oraat army of farmer soldiers was