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More corn sold . The trade reports that county shippers have sold a very 

 aubstantial amount of corn In the past few days, although they have not "been able to 

 ship all this corn to market. In. some places there hae been some difficulty in set- 

 ting cars for shipment, but with the recent price decline for hogs and eggs farmers 

 are more inclined to sell corn. It ie eftiticipated that as soon aa the moisture 

 content of corn declines to 20 percent or less, the farmers will market com rather 

 freely. The government announced the purchase of 100 million bushels of wheat for 

 feed from Canada this week. However, the supply of all feed grains per animal unit 

 is so much below last year that there should be no serious danger of com prices 

 declining below the ceiling level, 



Oilmeal . The amounts of soybean meal, cottonseed meal, and peanut meal to 

 be set aside for government distribution in February will be 20 percent of production, 

 the same as January. Protein meals continue in tight supply in spite of the fact ths' 

 production of oilseeds was large and processing operations are at capacity. The 

 I^ecember government crop report reduced the estimate about 10 million bushels, down 

 to 195,762 thousand bushels. That is 5 percent larger than the revised estimate for 

 the 19^2 crop of 187,155 thousand. Of the acreage harvested for beans this year 2^ 

 percent or approximately 5OO thousand acres wiere cut ripe to feed unthrashed. This 

 repreconted a prospective disappearance of approximately k- million bushels of mature 

 beans according to the crop report. 



Wool . In spite of the fact that there are enormous stocks of wool in 

 storage in the United States, and the fact that government orders for goods specifying 

 the use of domestic wools have slowed down somewhat, it is anticipated that the price 

 of wool this spring will be sustained by purchases for government account at the sime 

 level as last year. Foreign wool is about 15 to 20 percent cheaper than domestic 

 wool. Imports were large and the imported wool is used freely so that at the present 

 time there is a relatively small quantity of foreign wool in the hands of dealers. 

 However, it is reported that considerable quantities are en route and supplies are 

 expected to be ample in the near future. The agitation for the release by the govern- 

 ment of 330 million pounds of the foreign stocks has tended to slow up foreign buying. 

 Domestic mills are consuming as much wool as their capacity permits, and many of then 

 will find an increase in the dcanestic demand for woolen goods at the close of the war. 

 However, world stocks of wool are large, and we may find the urge to liquidate these 

 stocks so £reat that the price will decline after the war in spite of the anticipated 

 heavy domestic demand for woolen goods. 



The vegetable seed situation . The government is asking for a substantial 

 increase in victory gardens in 19^^ and has urged us to purchase our vegetable seeds 

 early. According to an article by J. W. Robson in the December "Illinois Fruit 

 Exchange News" there are shortages of several types of seeds but a plentiful supply 

 of others. There will be a short supply of cabbage and beet seeds and possibly of 

 tomato seeds. The supply of hybrid sweet corn seed appears to be adequate, but the 

 old open-pollinated varieties are scarce. There will be limited supplies of seed of 

 Swiss chard, ^c-^plant, kohlrabi, kale, parsnips, peppers, turnips, and rutabagas. We 

 have plenty of seed of spinach, carrots, most varieties of peas, beans and lima 

 beans . 



Presumably Mr. Robson made comparisons of avs^ilable supplies with quantities 

 needed for the increased production requested. 



