Evening star., 1923-04-22

JTHE down-trodden, hard work.
! ing packers, who get blamed in
this country for everything
| from the high price Of beef
steak to the low quality of sodawater,
are having their difficulties in Argen-
tina, where the health, happiness and
| we'll being of large proportion of
the rural population depends upon the
| number Of dollars and cents brought
| in trade by steer, pig or a sheep.
] The trouble just now seems to be that
the dollars and cents exchanged for
| these animals are remarkably few
| and far between, and as the pack kers
| own the dollars and the Argentinos
the live stock. the packers are rap
idly losing their popularity. The
I packers, by the way, who are respon-
sible for the howls of anguish heard
from the broad prairies of the Ar
| gentine, give their home address as
! Chicago.
! The story of the fall of the cattle
| industry in Argentina since the war
to its present black depth OF despair is
an old one, for the factors leading up to
it were the same which brought near
J ly everything else tumbling. During
I the war, wen Europe was buying
| beef wherever she could get it, Ar
gentina's livestock exports increased
1 to more than so per cent of her total
| exports. Farmers stopped raising
grain and took to raising cows, con-
| centrated on raising cows until there
were enough cattle to satisfy Eu
| ropes demand for beef for years to
| come. Prices were high, the packers
were packing merrily and loading
| tons of beef on ships for the soldiers.
| Then the war ended and the demand
let up. the price fell and the Argen-
| tine cattle growers found themselves
| with thousands of cows on their
( hands and nobody wanting cows any
| longer.
Chicago Packers Control.
With the exception OF one British
and one native-owned packing house,
the Argentine packing industry is
owned and controlled by Wilson,
Swift, Armour and other American
companies. Naturally. as the pack ger
| buys direct from the stockman, the
| packer was blamed when the price
| went down. Whether the blame was
| justified is another matter. What
concerns the packers now is the fact
that bills for the regulation of the
packing industry, bills for the estab-
| lishment of government-owned pack
| ing houses and bills proposing the
| appropriation of the packing proper
| ties are being introduced in the Ar
| gentine congress, with the result that
| it won't be long now before the
| packers in Argentina face even more
drastic restrictions than they have
| experienced in the United States.
Every piece of legislation designed
| to curb the power and activities of
| the Chicago packers in the United
| States is being studied in Argentina
The Argentine congress is deluged with
appeals for help and charges against
the tactics OF the packers, ranging from
combinations TO keep the price Of beef
down to conspiracies in restraint Of
trade. The practice in Argentina which
| enables the packer to buy direct from
the stockmen instead of going into the
| open market-as he is required to do
in this country-comes in for the
| strongest attack. BY this method the
packer sends far out into the country
and buys a herd of, say, 10000 steers
at the lowest prices he can get. He has
his cattle delivered as he needs them.
a few hundred or a few thousand at a
time, thus controlling his supply and
| his prices at the same time
| Newspapers Aid Propaganda.
| Argentine newspapers are printing
an interesting propaganda designed to
| force relief of some sort from con-
gress. 1t consists of displaying the
! Chicago prices for cattle alongside the