968 GENERAL FARM PROGRAM 



Mr. Wtckham. We have a very small percentage of No. 2's and 

 culls. There is no money in producing them. 



Mr. Andresen. You live next to the best market in the world. 



Mr. WiCKHAM. One hundred miles. 



Mr. Andresen. New York City and the other populous areas there. 

 You got about $3.45 as a support price for your 1948 crop of potatoes? 



Mr. WiCKHAM. No, sir; our potatoes are practically all marketed 

 during the summer season and we do not get, because of various fac- 

 tors, one of them the improbability of good storage conditions, the 

 increase during the winter months. Our potatoes are harvested dur- 

 ing the summer and early fall months and they are largely shipped at 

 that time. We get around $2.76 and it varies up or down, depending 

 upon how it is handled. 



Mr. Andresen. I know that some farmers on Long Island got 

 $3.45. 



Mr. WiCKHAM. I submit to you that if potatoes on Long Island 

 were stored until May they would be entitled to that payment. They 

 would earn it because the shrinkage would be very close to L5 percent. 

 Not only that, but your percentage of No. 2's and culls and pick-outs 

 will include another 5 or 10 percent so you will get a differential there. 

 Because we have a certain little difficulty with stored potatoes which 

 makes it impossible for them to pass United States No. 1 grade after 

 ab6ut the 15th of February, it is also justified. They could get it 

 but they would lose money by doing it, as a practical matter. 



Mr. Andresen. It is rather strange to me that the potato growers 

 on Long Island, living so close to a wonderful consuming market, that 

 1,800 farmers should receive an average of $13,168 apiece for the sale 

 of their potatoes to the Government. 



Mr. WiCKHAM. I am a farm boy. I can tell you what has happened. 

 You may not agree with me. 



Mr. Andresen. I am a farm boy, too. 



Mr. W^iCKHAM. You may put whatever interpretation you wish on 

 it. I will tell you what has happened. The outlets for diversion of 

 Irish potatoes are located in the jllast. They are primarily the Pub- 

 licker Company. If the United States Government is going to buy 

 potatoes for diversion purposes, tliey are not going to buy them out 

 of this area and ship them to Philadelphia. They are going to buy 

 them at the nearby markets and take them off at the nearest point 

 so they will not have this freight. 



Mr. Andresen. Can you see any good reason why they should buy 

 them all up in Long Island and in New York so as to provide a market 

 in New York for Canadian potatoes? 



Mr. WiCKHAM. No, sir, I cannot, but I can see a good reason for 

 their buying potatoes so they will have a very small freight charge in 

 getting them to a diversion point. There is no good in throwing good 

 money after bad. We know New York is the market for all the Na- 

 tion, the primary market. It is logical that they should take out of 

 that market the largest part of their diversion purchases. Because 

 of that, we in the metropolitan East and eastern seaboard in general 

 have, in a measure, been penalized. But that is one thing we have 

 tlu-eshed out in the industry. 



Mr. Andresen. As I look over the figures here, you have done 

 pretty well, too, since the support-price program went into opei-ation. 

 None of them have gone bankrupt, have they? 



