PROFITS OF DATE GROWING 179 



while it is devoid of dates, and be sold off before the 

 foreign importations arrive. I therefore see no 

 reason why the competition of imported Persian Gulf 

 fruit should lower the price of an earlier and more 

 attractive local product. 



The French in Algeria can put out Deglet Nurs, 

 however, that are packed in an attractive manner, 

 and owing to cheaper labor can probably do so more 

 cheaply than we can. At present choice dates, well 

 packed, sell at twenty and twenty-five cents a pound in 

 France and Algeria, and as the demand is steady the 

 price will hardly go lower than this. They might 

 conceivably interfere with the sale of American dessert 

 dates at fancy prices, such as $1.00 a pound, but 

 their competition can hardly be considered if twenty- 

 five or thirty cents a pound retail is taken as the 

 basis for calculations. 



Furthermore, the market for fresh dates will 

 always be a local monopoly, and I believe it will be 

 a profitable one, for the fresh date is not too perishable 

 to be shipped, and is liked by every one who tastes it. 



The total annual consumption of dates in the 

 United States is now in the neighborhood of 32,000,000 

 pounds a year, or something like five ounces per 

 person per year — a ridiculously small figure. The 

 great food value of the date allows every one to 

 purchase it as an integral part of the family diet — 

 not as a luxury or dessert, but with the feeling that it 

 is a part of his nourishment. Furthermore, the 

 American public now scarcely knows the value of 

 the date in any form except raw, and the teaching of 

 methods of cooking it will increase the consumption. 

 So far as the factor of supply and demand goes, I believe 

 that the consumption of dates will far exceed the 



