Cost of Producing Beets 249 



In many districts farmers maintain that the cost of 

 producing an acre of beets is over SI 00. This is prob- 

 ably much more than the farmer ordinarily spends, and 

 includes every expenditure that would be made in pro- 

 ducing a maximum crop. The farmer does not of course 

 commonly go to this amount of trouble and expense ; he 

 is usually satisfied to do a moderate amount of work and 

 to secure an acre-yield somewhere near the average. 



No accurate figures have been compiled for the cost of 

 producing a ton of beets or for producing the beets neces- 

 sary to make one hundred pounds of sugar. This phase 

 of the cost of beet production deserves more attention on 

 the part of students of beet-sugar economics. 



