The producers news. [volume] (Plentywood, Mont.) 1918-1937, 1922-12-29
SAPIRO URGES
CO-0PS TO CURE
! FARMERS ILLS
Country's Foremost Organizer of Mar
keting Associations Declares Move
ment Will Halt Dumping of Pro-
ducts-Real Root of Troubles.

Your American farmer is organic
ing for business, and the accent is on
in its literal sense, meaning trade
the business" [ am using the word
in its literal sense, meaning trade,
commerce. The most popular infer
ence that he is organizing "to get
things done" also applies, but it ap-
plies without any intimation of threat,
menace, or radical measures of any
sort.
Your American farmer is organizing
for business because he has found out
that his methods of doing business, as
they have been conducted heretofore,
are the real cause of his troubles to-
day far beyond any political discrim-
ination that he may think has existed
against him.
The cooperative marketing move
ment among American farmers today
is purely economic, without any po-
litical aspects whatsoever, and therein
lies a distinction which the general
should bear in mind
Farmers Bodies Aid
To say that cooperative marketing
leaders do not sympathize with the
sounder political aspirations of the
farmers, that they do not feel graft
fed by every new strength which he
acquires in the government Of this
country, and that they do not look
with a certain friendly favor upon the
general type of farm organizations
which is quasi-political, as well as ed
ucational, in its activities, would be
folly.
Cooperative marketing associations
owe much to the help of such organi-
cations as the Farm Bureau, the
Farmers Union, and others in the ed
ucation of farmers to the need for
cooperative marketing
Further, they have found, as an in
dispensable factor in" their present
success, the education of the banking
interests of this country by the War
Finance corporation, a credit agency
of the United States government, to
the fact that the cooperative market
ing associations are safe and sound
from a financial standpoint and are
fully entitled to the vast credits which
they require in their opertions. The
forthcoming meeting in Washington
concerns this fact.
No Radical Change Needed.
But the point is that government
aid and the support of other farm or
CARNATIONS have no part in the per-
manent aims and operations of the
co-operatives once they are set up.
They are designed to function COM
pletely within our social structure as
it exists today, and without requiring
any radical change except in the pres
ent speculative system of distributing
farm products
The whole idea of modern co-opera-
tive marketing is to stop the dump
ing" and substitute therefor the ''mer-
chandising" of farm products.
Of what we mean by merchandising
| shall try to give some idea in later
article. Meanwhile, if we are to I'M
derstand the cooperative movement at
all, it is necessary to realize at the
outset what We mean by dumping, and
to show that this evil of dumping is
at the root of the farmers ills today.
Farmer Gets Small Share.
Every man knows, or should know,
that the farmer receives, on the aver
age, a smaller percentage of the con-
sumer's dollar than the producer in
any other line Of American industry.
He works harder and longer hours
than anybody else, and yet his stand
ard of living today, except in certain
marked communities where co-opera-
tive marketing has for some time
been successfully applied, is a genera
ton behind that of his city brethren
Everybody also knows that when the
great crash in values began in the
fall of 1919, whereas other commodi-
ties as a rule declined more or less
gradually, and other businesses were
able to adjust themselves to process
of def1ation covering many months, the
prices on farm products crashed far
below the levels indicated by the law
of supply and demand almost immedi-
ately, and the average American farm
er found himself practically ruined ov-
er night.
Other Groups Organized.
All this is due to one fundamental
difference between the farmer and 9TH /
er producers. Other industries are or
gained, through the factory system,
for group production, and even more
highly organized, by the combination
of mary factories, in many instances,
into great mergers of one sort or an
other, for group selling.
The farmer has never been, and be-
cause Of the inherent nature of his
calling, which scatters him in millions
of complete production units all over
the face Of the land, never will be, or
gained for group production. And
until the coming of cooperative mar
keting, which is the only thing that
makes possible organization for group
selling without organization for group
he has never been orga-
nized for group selling.
Farmers Dump Products.
The result of the situation has been
as follows: that, whereas other in
1ustries, through a few gigantic SELL
ng organizations, deliver their pro-
luct gradually, throughout the year,
1nder expert merchandising and fin
ancing guidance, to the markets of the
world as those markets will absorb
hem, the farmer, producing through
put the year, has heretofore sold the
entire fruits of his years labor within
10 days on the average, after harvest.