GENERAL FARM PROGRAM 671 



Mr. Wales. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, first I 

 want to answer the question raised a while ago by saying that I am 

 not directly farming now, but I have been associated with farming 

 for several years, and I am representing the Eastern Colorado Devel- 

 opment Association, a newljT" organized organization, and they have 

 been very much interested in this matter. 



Mr. Hope. IVIay I say, Mr. Chairman, that Mr. Wales was formerly 

 a resident of my district. I have kno\vn him for many years, and 

 while he is not farmmg, he knows all about the farming problems and 

 has been following that for many years. 



Mr. Hill. He has been an assistant county agent and knows 

 about the whole program. 



Mr. Pace. We will be glad to hear you, Mr. Wales. 



Mr. Wales. First, Mr. Chairman, I am from a district that under 

 the present situation we think is in a rather unfortunate position, in 

 that the land has been broken out and put to wheat in the last 4 years, 

 the largest percentage of it; in the last 4 years the acreage in that 

 territory has trebled; that is, the acreage to wheat. Unfortunately 

 a part of the area is out of the area in which you can successfully raise 

 grain sorghum; it is too far north. A part of the land is in area in 

 which grain sorghums can be raised. And unfortunately we cannot 

 produce the feed; that is, grain feed for the cattle. We think that it is 

 a wheat-producmg area, based upon the records they have over the 

 past several years. We have summer fallowing in the area. And 

 it is a good practice, we think, because through summer fallowing 

 we have improved farming practices and that is the only way we can 

 continue to raise wheat in that territory. 



And there again we are, you might say, at a disadvantage, in that 

 we feel that to take this new area that is established for wheat and 

 start from where we are now and go back 10, 12, or 15 years, would be 

 a backward step. Why not step forward and establish acreage allot- 

 ments on that basis? We think the same things should be taken into 

 consideration, that the present acreage of wheat in the production 

 areas should be considered and not what was produced in the past 

 several years. 



We have greatly improved our methods; we have many young 

 farmers who have gone into farming, many of them have come from 

 the surrounding States of Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, and 

 so on and are now producing wheat, and a large percentage of those 

 boys are GI's. They have invested from $20,000 to $25,000 in 

 machinery, and if we take that acreage out of wheat, and if we cut 

 that acreage down in that territory, it will not be practical to have 

 that much machinery and that much equipment for farming. 



The value of the land has gone up to a point where grazing cattle 

 will not pay the interest on the capital investment in the land. 



And, as I started to say a while ago, if they do not get acreage 

 allotment the entire economy of that entire community would be 

 upset and we would have a lot of displaced persons. 



One reason of our feeling the way we do in that area is that we now 

 have improved varieties of wheat, we have improved methods of 

 farming, we have improved mobile power which makes the farming 

 practice required in that year possible. 



I was glad to hear Mr, Kuper say he wanted to be fair to all areas, 

 and I think that it is only fair that these new areas be given considera- 

 tion. 



