308 ANNUAL REPORTS OF DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



this line have been directed to replacing inefficient agents with those 



Eossessing demonstrated ability; establishing offices in suitable office 

 uildings; installing telephone, and other time-saving equipment; 

 and employing clerks. Every field agent now has a mimeograph, 

 an addressing machine, and an envelope sealer. Many of them have 

 adding machines, and three have folding machines. Nearly all of 

 them now have clerks. It formerly was the practice to do all of the 

 addressing and duplicating work in Washington. Under present 

 conditions, however, the field man is able not only to relieve the 

 Washington office of much of the burden formerly carried in connec- 

 tion with regular reports, but to make promptly general or restricted 

 special investigations, either upon its own initiative or upon tele- 

 graphic request from Washington. 



An outgrowth of the improved equipment is the publication by 

 field agents of crop reports, each for his own territory. Immediately 

 upon issuance of a crop report in Washington the United States 

 figures are telegraphed to each agent, together with figures for his 

 particular territory. He immediately issues a mimeographed report 

 with comments on crop and weather conditions in his State, copies 

 of which are furnished to the press and to the crop reporters. 



The agents of some of the States are now issuing reports on a 

 county basis, and these especially are wimiing warm approbation. 

 Many of the metropolitan dailies publish these reports in full, in some 

 instances giving first-page space to them. It has been planned, and 

 a beginning made, for each agent to send his State reports to his own 

 list of aids and to the county and township reporters, who have 

 already shown great interest in them, but difficulties of the situation 

 with regard to paper and envelopes threaten to curtail this distribu- 

 tion. 



During the year several meetings of groups of field agents were 

 held at convenient points for purposes of instruction by representa- 

 tives from the administrative office and for discussion of problems 

 in crop estimating common to groups of States. One such meeting 

 was held at Atlanta, Ga., in February, at which were present all field 

 agents from the cotton States. Another was held in Chicago last 

 April, of field agents from Iowa and the corn belt States east of the 

 Mississippi, including Wisconsin. A tliird meeting was held at 

 Lincoln, Nebr., in July, of field agents from the Mississippi to the 

 Rocky Mountains and from Missouri and Kansas northward to the 

 Canadian boundary. These meetings have proved very helpful in 

 solving special problems, in stimulating interest, in bringing about 

 better and more uniform methods, and in developing plans for im- 

 proved service. 



As to cooperation: 



Formal cooperative agreements have been entered into with the 

 State departments of agriculture in Wisconsin, Utah, Nebraska, and 

 Missouri. Informal cooperative relations have been established with 

 the College of Agriculture of Cornell University in New York. The 

 results have been so satisfactory that extension of this plan in other 

 States is contemplated. 



The objects sought are: 



(1) To obviate duplication of effort; (2) to permit the combined 

 agencies to secure fmler information concerning the subjects under 

 investigation; (3) to permit the consideration and adequate study 



