OUR FOOD SUPPLY OF THE FUTURE 



BY W. C. FITZSIMMONS. 



so-called economists take a gloomy 

 view of the possibility of producing food sup- 

 plies for the increasing number of the earth's inhabi- 

 tants. But if we take the facts and figures of annual 

 production in the United States as a basis of reason- 

 ing, it will appear that the time is very remote when 

 the productive capacity of the earth under usual con- 

 ditions will fall below the most ample requirements 

 of the most exacting population. It should be under- 

 stood that our methods of producing the staple crops 

 are as yet in a stage of barbarism ; and this fact alone 

 must afford good ground for a hopeful outlook in the 

 direction of increased production as improved pro- 

 cesses are adopted. That we are gaining ground 

 along the line of reasonable and scientific production 

 is certain ; but when farmers burn the straw of their 

 wheat fields and the manure of their barn-yards, as 

 hundreds of them yet do, the march towards perfec- 

 tion is necessarily slow. Three hundred years ago 

 the yield of wheat per acre in England and Scotland 

 was probably not one-half what it is to-day, thus show- 

 ing that the soil need not become exhausted even under 

 such treatment as British farmers accord to their 

 land. From data covering large areas it is proven 

 that soils maybe renewed and even greatly improved 

 as the process of cultivation goes on year by year. 



But to confine ourselves to conditions surrounding 

 us here in the United States, we may draw some 

 interesting conclusions from the following facts: 

 During the year 1893 the total area occupied by 

 the staple crops of wheat, corn, rye, barley, 

 oats, buckwheat, hay, potatoes and fruit was 

 193,000,000 acres, or 301,000 square miles. Inspec- 

 tion reveals the fact that this cultivated area in 

 the United States lacks 123,000 square miles of being 

 equal to the combined areas of Texas and California. 

 Throwing aside then this 123,000 square miles as 

 waste land in the two States named, they could 

 produce all the staples which are now grown in the 

 entire country. To go outside the mere realm of 

 calculation based upon areas alone, it is wholly 

 certain that the two States mentioned could, under 

 proper systems of irrigation, which will surely be de- 

 veloped in the future, produce greatly more of the 

 crops named than the whole country produces now. 

 And let it be understood in this connection that of the 



crops grown on the area given enormous quantities 

 were sent abroad. If it be contended that these 

 foreign shipments were made in payment for other 

 products not suited to our agriculture, it may be said 

 that probably more than four-fifths of the agricultural 

 products purchased in other countries could easily be 

 grown on our own farms. For example : We exported 

 breadstuffs to the value of $187,394,840 in 1893, and 

 imported sugar and molasses to the value of $123,- 

 741,678, every pound of which could and should be 

 produced in the United States. We exported meat 

 and dairy products to the value of $135,205,783, and 

 bought abroad fruits and nuts to the value of $11,471,- 

 130, while every pound of such fruits could be easily 

 produced in California and Florida alone. And so 

 on through a long list. To the student of the facts of 

 production, and not merely to the theories of pessi- 

 mists, it must be clear that earth's teeming millions 

 are in much less danger of starvation individually or 

 in masses than they were two thousand years ago, 

 when the population was only a fraction of what it is 

 to-day. It is clear to the man who reflects, that while 

 the earth's population doubles itself in a century or 

 thereabouts, the production of all the essentials of 

 living may, by a rational and possible concert of 

 action, be greatly increased if not indeed doubled in 

 a single year. Assuming that only the sixty-five 

 million people in the United States are maintained 

 by the products of our farms, it will be seen to 

 require three acres for each person. Assuming that 

 the 1,500,000,000 inhabitants now supposed to be on 

 this planet were all fed, clothed and housed as well 

 as ourselves, the area required to yield their support 

 would be but 7,000,000 square miles of the 50,000,000 

 comprising the land surface of the earth. Thus, even 

 at the rate of production now prevailing, a cultivable 

 territory as large as South America would feed and 

 maintain all mankind. In view of these facts, there- 

 fore, and in face of a great over-production already 

 in many lines, it would appear to be a waste of labor 

 to attempt to show that mankind is in imminent 

 danger of depletion in numbers and deterioration in 

 mental and physical estate by reason of a lack of the 

 essentials wherewith to feed, clothe and shelter the 

 increasing millions of the children of men. 



