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Show I 1 IRRIGATION WORK OF LAND RECLAMA- TION. B Arthur Hooker, secretary of the B board of control of the National Ir- B rition Congress, will present a rcs- B olution for approval by that organi- B zation at its seventeenth sessions in B Spokane, August 9 to 14, mcmoraliz- B ing Congress to issue 3 per cent gold B bonds, running 100 years, to the m amount of $5,000,000,000, or as much H thereof as may be necessary, for the a following specific purposes: H One billion dollars for drainage of H overflowed and swamp Jands, thus H reclaiming an area equal to 100,000 H square miles. H One billion dollars for the rcclama H tion by irrigation of 40,000,000 acre I of arid and' semi-arid lands, now pare- H ly or wholly waste. One billion dollars to construct H and improve deep waterways, to de- velop thousands of miles of territory I now without adequate transportation facilities. I One billion dollars for good roads I and national highways, for the lack I of which the toss to the farm area I of the United States is- tipproximaU- I ly $500,000,000 annually. I One billion dollars for forest pro- I lection, reforestation and consenya- B tion of the forest' resources, thus as suring timber and lumber supplies for centuries to come. "Five billions of dollars is" an enormous enor-mous sum, but it is no more than is actually required to carry out the gigantic scheme in developing millions mil-lions of acres of lands in various, "parts of the United States now absolutely ab-solutely worthless," said Mr. Hooker in explaining the plan. "Congress will not be asked to appropriate a penny. The returns from the improvements im-provements would pay of! the bonds. The government would simply act in a banker, a it does now for the various irrigation projects. The bond issue would provide ample funds as required to carry out the work in the several divisions, at the same time giving the best possible collateral to those investing in these securities. "Government figures bear out the statement that there is enough good laud overflowed in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Wis-consin, Kansas, Nebraska, Louisiana, Kentucky, Tennessee and Mississippi to make an area as large as the state of Missouri, or more than 44,000,000 acres', while in the eastern, central, and western states there is more than as much 'more, or about 100,000,000 acres in all. At a conservative estimate es-timate of $25 an acre, the sale of this reclaimed land would justify the. ex-peuditurc ex-peuditurc of $2,500,000,000,, 9r 150 per ccn t more than is required to drain it. This land would support from 2,000,000 to 3,000,00 population. popula-tion. "Approximately 40,000,000 acres of lands in western and southwestern states arc adapted to irrigation, which,if reclaimed -at an average cost of $25 an acre, would be worth not less than $200 an acre or a total of $8,000,000,000, and provide homes for more than 8,000,000 persons. The economic value of irrigation cannot be measured in dollars and cents, but crops of from $500 to 1,000 an acre are not rare in the irrigated districts. There arc already 14,000,000 acres under un-der irrigation and the reclamation service estimates it will have reclaimed reclaim-ed 2,000,000 acres, at a cost not exceeding ex-ceeding $70,000,000, before the close of 1911. "The construction and fmprovc-mentof fmprovc-mentof the deep waterways required to better and cheaper transportation facilities is, I believe, a 100 per cent investment, from the fact that two-thirds two-thirds of the bulky freght could be shipped by water routes, at a cost to the shipper of not more than one-sixth one-sixth of the present rail rates'. The importance of this becomes apparent when it is remembered that the food question is becoming a world problem. prob-lem. "The state of New York is expending expend-ing $101,000,000 to enlarge the Eric canal, and $1000,000,000 is the amount required to improve the Missouri river from a point about 40 miles .west of Yellowstone park to where it meets Mississippi river, 2,547 miles. Then there is the projected waterway water-way from Lake Michigan to the Gulf of Mexico and scores of others ncces- I sary to cheap' and better transportation transporta-tion facilities. Millions of dollars I will be saved annually to the people of the United States by the comple- lion of these works. "The maintenance of the greatest waterway in the world, composed of the Great Lakes, on which the government gov-ernment of the United States has ex- j pended more than $90,000,000 for harbors and connecting channels, presents an argument in favor of the scheme to develop thousands of miles of territory in the Missouri and other i valleys. The other projects outlined i in the foregoing are of equal if not greater importance, and with proper backing they can be carried out successfully. suc-cessfully. "No one questions the statement 1 that good roads have a high money y value to the farmers of the nation, j and it may be said that this alone j is sufficient to justify the cost of j their construction as rapidly as practicable prac-ticable under an efficient, economical and equitable system of highway improvement. im-provement. The big points in favor of his expenditure is the economy of time and force in transportation between farm and market, enabling th e growers to take advantage of fluctuations in buying and selling, as . well as enhancing the value of real estate. "It is estimated that the average annual loss from poor roads is 70 cents an acre, while the estimated average increase resulting from improving im-proving all the public roadss $9. The losses in five years would aggregate aggre-gate $2,432 for every section of land, or more than enough to rmprove nvo miles of public highway. The necessity neces-sity of good roads is obvious, -as it would enhance the value of each section sec-tion of land about $5,760, or more than double the estimated cost of two miles of improved highway, which constitutes the quota for 640 acres of land. 'HTlje value of our forests, was never better appreciated than today, 1 1 t W.ithin the arid ad semi-arid por tions of the w stern states nearly 124,000,000 acres are covchcr with woodland, of value for fuel, fenc posts and other purposes cscntial to the success of the farmers. There also is 97,000,000 acres covered witn heavy forests having commercial value for timber and logs for sam- ' mills, also hundreds of thousands of acres of timber land in other parts '. I the United States. Reforestation and conservation of the vast resources re-sources arc necessary to provide future fu-ture generations with timber and umber supplies. The government is expending large amounts of money every year to protect its forests from itrcs, yet expert lumbermen say that mere standing timber is destroyed by Haines annually than is convcted into ! merchantable lumber b ythc saw- mi!." Mr. Hooker said it is1 likely that his ! resolution will be presented to the various interests of the irrigation congress for discussion and will aftc" ward 1-c incorporated in a memorial to the United States Congress. It is also proposed to have a large delegation, delega-tion, composed of representatives of every state and territory in the Union, push the measure for adoption. adop-tion. The work of enlisting the support sup-port of the people interested in tlje various projects will be taken up im-" im-" mediately after the close of the Irrigation Irri-gation congress with the view to concerted con-certed action. 1 . o |