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Show ONE-CROP SYSTEM RtSllTS 'southern FarmTTTping Inevitable j Consequences In an Impoverished I . Soil and Small Yields. The present agricultural troubles of the South are not due to " soils or climate, but to a faulty System. Sys-tem. Suclf a system has always failed, not so much, nowever. because of overproduction, or that al the eggs have been in one basket, as that a one- I crop system always means poor soli ; and low crop yields. 1 If we had a reasonable assurance; that every acre planted in oats would; produce fifty to sixty bushels every acre in corn forty to fifty bushels and! every acre in cotton a tale of ouu, pounds, we could snap our fingers at, six-cent cotton, feeg confident ofl prosperity in times of v.ar as well in times of peace. if our present troubles, whatever? hardships they may have in store for. , us, lead to a sysleta of agricultural; which will build up soil fertility, tbe(; sacrifices may not be too great. For one year, or for even a short term of, years, cotton must sell for a very low: price, indeed, to make it less "VUract- ive from a purely ready-cash, stand-' point than any other crop avajjlabley but no system which does not produCef ; a rich and productive soil can evert protect us against times like these . . Any cotton farmer can show bejl jd; any argument that cotton is the best; ' money crop for, the South. In fact,, he can show with unanswerable figures fig-ures wherein it will pay to' plant cot-- 1 ton and buy feed and food supplies, so long as cotton brings eight or ten cents a pound; but a serious fact! stands Bquarely against his theory. W" have planted cotton and bought eup plies and the records show that diir- ing the 50 years we have followed that system our yields have averaged 175 pounds of cotton, less than twenty . bushels of corn and not over twenty bushels ot oats per acre. And now, when cotton prices make such a yield, even of so good1 a crop-as crop-as cotton, unprofitable, we are left stranded, because in following the one-crop one-crop system we are reaping its inevitable inev-itable consequences in an impoverished impover-ished soil, ignorance of how to make' other crops, and the absence of established estab-lished markets and marketing systems sys-tems for these crops. If we had a rich soil we could overcome all other difficulties. diffi-culties. No country with a rich r,oil.' if owned by the men who till it, is ever in danger of serious financial or business disaster. Prog"3L3.ve Farmer. |
