The daily worker., 1931-12-21
BY HARRISON GEORGE.

ATE In october and early November, when
the Japanese Army was advancing "to re-
pair bridge on the road to Tsitsihar-and the
Soviet frontier, the price of wheat suddenly shot
up, Chicago wheat pit prices rising from about
so cents a bushel to 73 cents practically over
night.
Great WIS the rejoicing. Cowbelis, firecrack-
ers and bonfires marked the celebration (some-
what prematurely to be sure) of the prosper
ity comeback" in Kansas towns where farmers
had been trying to sell wheat for 28 and 80
cents bushel-and no buyers
Explanations spouted forth from capitalist
economists" like streams from fountain. Sud
den and most mysterious Shortages" appeared
here, there and everywhere to the establishment
Of everyone who had been told by these same
Economists" that there simply was ''too much
wheat in the world"
Secretary Hyde's Department Of Agriculture
burst forth With suddenly acquired optimism at
the Shortage" which magically appeared in the
Soviet Union, French, German and Australian
wheat crops. About the Soviet, the Dept. OF
Agriculture on Nov. I, gave the following
prophecy:
Evidence is accommodating which points to
Russian crop considerably smaller than in
1880"
f1UW uuCn WAS III CfuS f1OOVSlldn IOre-
cast can be seen by the dispatch appearing in
the N. 7. Times Of December Is, from its Mos
COW correspondent, whose refutation of Mr.
Hydes prophecy Of six weeks earlier is summed
up In the following:
THE prospects for grain collections we're
brighter today-Udth an official announce
ment that there was already more grain in
the state granaries than the total amount col
lected last year"
But back there when Laval was leaving and
the Japanese advancing toward the Soviet bor-
der all was rosy. Not only the Soviet wheat
crop was short, but from Berlin the N. Y. Times
Of Nov. 3, told us Of an unexphcable calamity
that had come over the French and German
crops:
"Trom so,oOo,ooo to 100000 bushels Of
French and German wheat, 1t is estimated (by
whom, the correspondent was too modest to
state-H O. will need replacement because
of rain"
But that was on Nov. g. on a "bulr' market.
market, moreover, that was slowed up not at
all by the publication on November IL IN. Y.
Times) Of the following refutation Of this mys-
terious discovery of such extraordinary total Of
spcilage by rain:
The French Ministry OF Agriculture states
that the French wheat harvest in 1881 would
be $685. ,95e bushels as against a little more
than 230,000000 bushels In 1890"
As to Australia, the explanation" given by no
less an authority than the N. Y Annalst
writer, Winthrop W. Case, in the issue of No
vember 13, stated:
"The 193l-32 Australian crop is variously
estimated at from 1sS,OOoO00 to 1872, 100000
bushels compared with 213OO0,00O in 193O-31,
and 127,000,0o0 the year previous. The pres
ent acreage is placed at 1880 900, a ass per
cent reduction from the 1s,149,0OO acres in
1s90-3i"
Alas, for the prophecy Of Production" by this
"expert"l For on December 16, the Associated
Press dispatch from Canberra, Australia, car
ned the following:
Despite low world prices, planting OF wheat
in Australia has been extended and the Fed
eral Department OF Markets anticipates the
coming harvest will yield more than 212,OOO0O0
bushels, The state Of Western Australia has
greatly extended the acreage. >"
There remains 10 see what sort OF shortage"
there is in the United States to have justified
the great outburst OF capitalist optimism in Oc-
tober and November when wheat prices rose
and Mr.. julius Klein of the Dept of Commerce
told one and all that the agricultural "recov-
cry" meant that (again) "a turn" had come and
all the world would soon be wallowing in
"propsx1ty."
Secretary Hyds OF the Agricultural Dept had
sst Ids heart On reduction Of acreage" TO be