THOMAS B. NOLAN 63 



ciency that they now consistently outrun the capacity of the economy 

 to consume what they produce. . . . Though population is growing 

 and Hving standards are rising, the productive capacity of our agri- 

 culture promises for many years to keep increasingly ahead of both." ^^ 



The report of this commission is really a most impressive testi- 

 monial of the effectiveness of the research programs in agriculture 

 and forestry during the last fifty years; it is encouraging to consider 

 that in some respects these are analogous to the threefold research 

 program now being initiated in the minerals field. The widespread 

 acceptance of such practices as crop rotation in agriculture and of 

 the principle of sustained yield in forestry has increased the resource 

 base in the same way that improved exploration techniques have in 

 the mineral resource field. And the success of the studies on plant 

 breeding, on the control of pests and blights, and on improved culti- 

 vation practices have had a comparable effect in increasing yields as 

 has the utilization of lower and lower grade material in minerals. 

 Finally, the noteworthy advances in utilization of food and forest 

 products, through the research activities of the Forest Products Labo- 

 ratory and the Agricultural Experiment Stations, have not only elimi- 

 nated much of the waste that concerned the conferees of fifty years 

 ago, but have, especially for forest products, actually increased the 

 resource because of a new ability to utUize the waste products for the 

 same purposes as the primary product. 



The situation in regard to soils, in contrast to the products of the 

 soil, is basically more like that of mineral resources, since the produc- 

 tion of soil from rock is a geologic process and can be accomplished 

 only in units of geologic rather than everyday time. I have the im- 

 pression that our slower progress in better utilizing and in expanding 

 our soil resources lies partly in our failure to appreciate this, and 

 partly in our lack of knowledge of the nature of the erosion that 

 locally so dramatically destroys or removes some of our best soils. 



I suspect also that far too Uttle research has been done on the de- 

 tails of processes in soil-profile development and other aspects of soil 

 morphology. The present practice of soil classification will probably 



-*J. Leroy Welsh and others, Report to the Congress from the Commission 

 on Increased Industrial Use of Agricultural Products, 85th Congress, 1st Ses- 

 sion, Senate Doc. 45, 1957, p. viii. 



