1050 GENERAL FARM PROGRAM 



Exhibit B. — Break-down of harvest and hauling-to-mill cost per ton basis 



Bunching ^ $1. 50 



Picking and scrapping 8. 00 



Transportation of pickers 1. 60 



Bags, baskets, and twine 2. 50 



Sacking and running crew 2. 00 



Hauling to mill 2. 25 



Overhead , 1. 79 



Total ..19. 64 



[From the Weekly Democrat, Poplarville, Miss.] 

 We Seek Consideration 



Indications from Washington are that a congressional committee will grant 

 southern tung-oil producers a hearing at an early date at which producers will 

 present their case in support of a plea for the placing of tung on the parity list. 



We have no way of knowing the attitude of members of the congressional 

 committee or of the Department of Agriculture toward the plea of tung producers. 

 No doubt the gentlemen of this committee are withholding judgment until they 

 have heard and weighed carefully all angles of the industry. 



We urge their careful consideration of the plea of the producers — a plea voiced 

 with the full support of business and professional people throughout the six 

 Southern States in which tung plantings are located. • 



We feel that the economic life, to a great extent, of this coastal area is at stake 

 in the scheduled hearings. 



A short span of time back in the past, this coastal area was wealthy in timber 

 resources. Millions were made in the cutting and selling of the virgin forests. 

 Then the timber was gone, leaving the people with barren cut-over land that is 

 not especially adapted to row-crop farming. Some substitute, some means of 

 providing a livelihood for the people was sought. Livestock was the partial 

 answer, but livestock, alone, could not bridge the void between the wealth of the 

 timber days to the barren land of the present. 



Tung appeared oi the scene and furnished the answer. Tung, combined with 

 the production of livestock, brought the per family income of our people back 

 up to a level which afforded an American standard of living — until the price 

 fell below the economic level at which other commodities have been held. 



The present price of tung, approximately $45 per ton for the nuts, is unjust to 

 the farmer who produces tung; is unjust to the merchant who supplies that farmer 

 with the necessities of life; is unjust to the economic life of the area; and is unjvist 

 to the consumer of this vital oil. Under the present price level, the consumer of 

 tung oil cannot be assured of an adequate supply to justify long-range industrial 

 planning. 



The average price for the nuts in 1939 was $42 for a crop that was 1,160 tons. 

 The price continued to rise until 1944, the farmer received $102 per ton for a 

 2,680-ton crop. The next 3 years saw the price decline to $98.90, $96.90, and the 

 $73.60 figure of 1947— and 1948 at $45. 



Tung oil fell better than 50 percent in value, yet the items which the farmer 

 had to bu.y in order to produce tung — fertilizer, implements, food, etc. — advanced 

 almost 50 percent in cost. Such a trend could only result in discouraging the 

 farmer, reduce the tonnage of oil produced on a long-range basis and cripple the 

 economic life of the area involved. 



During the war the Japanese cut our shipping lines from China off, leaving our 

 armed forces wholly dependent upon the efforts of the American producers to 

 supply them with a vital war commodity. It took all the effort of the American 

 farmer to produce enough for the armed forces, alone, without producing any for 

 civilian use. That farmer was rewarded for his effort by having the price struc- 

 ture of tung cut from under him as soon as hostilities ended. 



In event another war should come — and we do not wish to see that happen — 

 where would our armed forces be in regard to timg oil? Russia would quickly 

 strike at cutting us away from China again — leaving only the American grower to 

 supply the demand. If we wreck that American farmer with an uneven price 

 structure, will he be able to come back fast enough to do his part? 



In 1948 on a deflated tung market, tung oil was better than a $3,000,000 industry 

 from the i^roducing end alone. Add to that the industrial and consuming end 

 end and it is a big industry — sound, proven, and going. 



