Handling, Distributing, and Sale of Fruit 217 



fected to the industry, the relations between the shippers 

 and transportation companies were improved, the whole- 

 sale dealers paid higher prices for the fruit, the retailers 

 could charge the consumer a lower price because all the 

 fruit was sound, and a better feeling in general pervaded 

 every branch of the industry. But this is not all. The 

 better handling of the fruit by the cooperative organiza- 

 tions quickened the cooperative spirit among the fruit- 

 growers. The trees of the members are now often fumi- 

 gated by the associations, or by cooperative fumigation 

 associations, and spraying is often done in the same way. 

 Protection of the orchards against frost is sometimes 

 handled in the same way. In some cases pruning is done 

 by the associations, and every operation that the associa- 

 tions perform is done better than it ever was before. In 

 an unorganized agricultural industry it is impossible to 

 bring about a reform of this kind. The average individual 

 grower cannot handle such a question alone. If properly 

 managed, the association raises the economic efficiency of 

 a community because it can apply methods to the opera- 

 tions of all the growers that can only be applied by the 

 exceptional grower who works by himself. 



The harvesting of fruit by an association is not practical 

 in all kinds of fruit-growing. In the quick-ripening sum- 

 mer fruits, the method is too cumbersome. In apple- 

 growing it may be applied if the association can find com- 

 petent foremen to handle the labor. If the association 

 cannot harvest the fruit, it can adopt rules of picking to be 

 followed by each member, and it can enforce these rules 

 through inspectors whose duty it is to inspect the picking 

 and handling operations on each farm and by a rigid in- 



