Fitzgerald leader enterprise and press., 1926-11-11
FARMING METHODS MUST
UNDERGO CHANGE TO
ATTAIN PROSPERITY
By C. A. COBB :. ~
Editor, The Southern RuraEst

! pTOuuCLlOiS 40 WcA 6o S'S
measure of cooperation on the part
: of all forces that can have any in
flunece whatever.
Admitting that we have grown
more cotton than can be sold at an
attractive price and that the abund-
; ance of other crops: peaches and
watermelons notably, brought on
lot of trouble and disappointment, 1t
is, nevertheless, mighty hard to starve
section to death fortified as the
South is at the present time.
There are few mighty important
facts that we should always keep in
mind if we are to properly measure
the true conditions among our people.
The farm mortgage Indebtedness
here in the South is on an average
far below that of any other compara-
BILE section, drawing lightly upon
agricultural income. Land values
have been held to same levels. Cen
eral indebtedness has not increased,
and with plenty of food and feed our
farmers, even with disappointing
cotton price, will not have to go into
debt as they would have been forced
to do were our debts as great as they
are in other sections and were WIS
less well provisioned.
Of course, there will be a read
justment of acreage and farm pro-
grams generally. While we often do
some mighty foolish things such as
planting too many acres to cotton,
such foolish conduct is rarely follow
ed by repetition of the same thing.
We are realizing even that an
abundance of food and feed crops
does not make up the enormous de-
ficit in meat, milk, butter, lard and
poultry products. We are realizing
also that the very markets that are
so extremely Indifferent about cot
ton right now are fine markets for
the products of the dairy herd, the
hog lot, and the poultry yard. See
ing all of this and realizing afresh
the folly of depending too largely
upon any single crop and of shipping
all of these commodities in from dis
tant states, suggests a lot that can
be done to avoid troubles we have
been experiencing in the past few
weeks. Indeed, we have it in our
power to make cotton a really pro-
fitable crop if we will just WELD that
power.
There will be revival of interest
in hogs and dairy cows and poultry.
Along with this increased interest in
live stock the whole program of farm
ing will undergo the sort of change
that is necessary to attain perma-
nence and prosperity in the industry.
Pasture building, for instance, will
occupy much time in the future
Fences will be put where there were
never fences gefore, and barns and
all manner of housing equipment will
claim thought and attention. AS the
natural result of the right sort OF
combination our soils will be keut
busy from Christmas to Christmas,
and the building process will go on
winter and summer restoring to de-
pleted acres some the fertility that
has been taken out in these scores
of years of all-cotton farming. With
lour soils saved and re-capitalized,
and our glorious climatic conditions
transformed into a paying asset, as
will be the case when we change to
the right plan, we as an agricultural
people should attain degree of pro-
gress unequalled anywhere else, even
in Denmark where there are no poor
people. on the farms and where there
is no illiteracy, where the income of
the man on the farm is at this time
about equal to that of the man IN
industry here, where the highest
wages in all history are now being
paid.
Fortunately, there is no pioneering
necessary. The practicability of all
that our folks should do has been
profitably demonstrated ali over the
world. The best farmers, the most
prosperous farmers, and there are
many who are prospering in spite of
the low price of cotton, are all doing
; what is here suggested. The most
prosperous communities in the cotton
belt today-take that around Stark
vile, Miss, for instance, an old cot
ton community which has been trans
formed into veritable beehive of
agricultural activity and prosperity
of balanced farming that must event.
are those that are following the type
uaIly be adopted everywhere.
And the markets are here for the
products of such system. They are
here now for the millions of dollars
worth of those products that we have
failed to produce even in this year
of abundance. Industry is growing
throughout the South by leaps and
bounds, building markets for farm