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Show up " IT BLAME FARMER FOR FOOD PRICE Dont blame the farmer for higher food prices. In A 'act, explains Lloyd A. Clement, extension economist at ttah State University, farmers are the consumers' best friend. it The American agricultural industry, he points out, 6t c"tlnues to produce more than commercial markets will a, 0 at prevailing prices and they can do even better e situation should warrant TJ-' 'is unparalleled production has kept food prices from lng higher than they are while the prices received by 1 -hi fiarmer haVE averaSed no more, most often consider-1 consider-1 ' y less, than those of 20 years ago, says the economist. cost has increased 42; transportation trans-portation is up 60; housing 42; rent, 52, and medical care, 86; while all food, including in-cluding eating away from home, has increased about 27 over the past 20 years. It is Clement's contenetion that consumers should be ever gateful to this nation's agricultural agri-cultural producers who have stayed on the job, 'cutting expenses ex-penses wherever and whenever possible, and putting on the dinner tables of this nation the finest food in the greatest abundance ever known. Mr. Clement does not believe consumers con-sumers would be willing to trade places with a farmer in order to have an opportunity to share the odds a farmer faces every day in the operation opera-tion of his business. . ket'"g bill has more than J in the last 20 years. the are lots of reasons, mcreased population has i HY0lUme ' 0f f00d ihirt y more than one" H Marketing services have tonsil Y ne-half because want and are get-Z get-Z mmre ting, grading, i ng, packaging, process "v en rag6' mre built"in iCecaensdand they areeat- hon,e. and more away from noted that labor costs n 117 nearly half of the a food marketing bin Plant L 6 d0ubled- New JS: with . equiPment costs, Wial! f 'nation, ma-rent ma-rent SJ packagmg, interest, 55 o p!0 3X?S keeP climbing, 'rmerP o lon costs for th& Queers' h agricultural pro-strivin. pro-strivin. 6 emPhasized, are lueeJ h meet this Price-cost loiver Co f Producing more at most effif, ' a"d are today the naUon Producers in the in8 hard f t0' are Push" toarltotin more efficient lion g and Product promo- e?UbmerS conti""e to be fa-Miiie fa-Miiie f lncreasing incomes spite hiJiT inC0me laSs- De-sumers De-sumers food Prices, con- comes fo "d less f their in- in hisw food than any tim'3 bCSt' says T gGtting the For c econmist. might miparison, consumers Por aU h er these f;gures: Ilems except food, the |