Show y WE ARE LONG ON production SHORT ON distribution by peter radford lecturer national farmers union the economic of farm products is today the world a greatest problem and the war while it has brought its hardships has clearly em the importance of lion as a factor in american agrical ture and promises to give the tarm ers the co of the govern ment and t e sin 0 r en the solution ot buirk ling problem this result in a measure corn us tor our war losses for the business interests and government have been in the main assisting al most exclusively on the production side ot agriculture while the department ot agriculture has been dumping tons ot literature on the farmer telling him how to produce the farmer has been dumping tons of products in the nations garbage can for want of a market the world will never starve at no time since adam and eve were arh from the garden of eden have the inhabitants of this world suffered from lack of production but some people have gone hungry from the day of creation to this good hour for the lack of proper distribution slight variations in production have forced a change in diet and one locality has felt the pit ch of want while another surfeited but the world as a whole has ever been a land of plenty we now have les than one tenth ot the tillable land of the earths surface under cultivation and we not only have this surplus area to draw on but U Is safe to estimate that in case of dire necessity one halt the earths could at the present time nock their living out of the treba of the forest gather it from wild vines and draw it from streams no one should become alarmed the world will never starve the consumer has always feared that the producer would not supply him and his fright has found euprea alon on the statute books of our states and nations and the farmer has been to produce recklessly and with out reference to a market and regard less of the demands of the consumer back to the soil the city people have been urging rich other to move back to the farm but very few of them have moved we welcome our city cousins back to the soil and this earths surface contains idle acres of tillable land where they can make a by tickling the earth with a forked stick but we do cot need them fo far as increasing production Is concerned we now have all the producers e can uee the city man has very erroneous ideas of agricultural condl ons the commonly accepted theory hat we are short on production Is all wrong our annual increase in production far exceeds that ot our increase in population the world as a farm taking the world as one big farm we find two billion acres of land in cultivation of this amount there Is approximately acres on the western and acres on the eastern hemisphere in cultivation this estimate of course does not include grazing iuds forests etc where large quantities of meat are produced the worlds annual crop mates fifteen billion bushels of cereals thirteen billion pounds of fabre fibre and sixty five million tons of meat the average annual florid crop tor the past five years compared with the previous five years Is as follows past half previous halt crops decade decade corn fda iOOr Wheat Du 3 3 oats bu cotton bales the world shows an average in crease in cereal production of 1 per cent during the past decade compared ith the previous five years while the worlds population an increase of only three per cent the gain in production far exceeds that of our increase in population and it Is safe to estimate that the farmer can easily increase production 25 per cent if a remunerative market can be found for the products in textile fabres fibres the world shows an during the past half decade in production of 15 per cent against a population increase of three per cent the people of this nation should address themselves to the sublet of improved facilities tor distribution overproduction and crop mortgage force the farmers into ruinous competition with each other the remedy lies in organization and in cooperation in marketing I 1 i jah uniform sparking plug standardization of sparking plugs tor automobiles has been attempted by the american association of licensed automobile manufacturers the mechanical ch branch of this association for some time has been working on pro tor the the form now agreed upon has a beven eighths inch diameter of thread 18 pitch a shouldered or flanged seat one and one eighth inch in diameter a minimum length below the shoulder of one half inch and a hexagon bead beyea cleutha inch across aba flata |