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Show Annual Harvest of Brewing Crops By Farm Workers in Many States "iROPS worth $100,000,000 are now being harvested for American Ameri-can brewers, with farmers, processors proc-essors and intermediate handlers pocketing the cash. Barley, hops, corn and rice are the farm crops that go into beer and ale. Harvesting begins with the gathering of the rice, which starts usually in August, followed by the barley and hop crops. The hop -picking period lasts more than a month on a cycle which moves from Southern to Northern states principally along the Pacific Coast. Corn is shucked and sent to the elevators until late In the Winter. It takes about a half-pound of hops, 52 pounds of carefully selected select-ed barley, and from 17 to 21 pounds of either corn or rice, before processing, proc-essing, to produce a 31-gallon barrel bar-rel of beer or ale. The barley, converted into malt, supplies "body" to the brew, while the hops give flavor, aroma and preservative qualities. Corn or rice, used as a malt adjunct, reduces the protein content of beer and produces pro-duces a crystal-clear beverage conforming con-forming to American taste standards. stand-ards. It requires about four billion pounds of these premium products to produce America's normal output out-put of malt beverages. The $600,-000,000 $600,-000,000 paid by brewers for these farm crops since beer's relegaltza-tion relegaltza-tion in 1933 has gone principally to fanners, with the remainder distributed dis-tributed among processors, transportation trans-portation industries and other service ser-vice industries. |