FOOD AND POPULATION. 



obtaining as to acreage iu food staples, the result now being an ascending scale of prices 

 for farm products, an advance in land values, coming scarcity and a very brisk demand 

 for farm products, 



A most significant fact, made very clear by the forgoing table, is that with a seventh 

 mor« people to feed the increase in the acreage devoted to food production, during the 

 ninth decade, was but a little more than half what it was in the eighth, when to have 

 kept pace with the increase in population it should have been 36 per cent, greater and 

 there can be no reasonable doubt that but for the acreage iu excess of current needs, exist- 

 ing at the beginning of the ninth decade, the pinch of scarcity would long since have 

 been felt. 



It is equally significant that the United States has contributed such a very large 

 proportion to of all recent additions to the world's food producing areas, the extent and 

 proportions 6f such contributions being made clear in the subjoined table, where is shown 

 the aggregate of all such additions, the number of acres contributed by the United Slates 

 and the percentage of the whole so contributed: 



Year 



1S70 



1880 



IS'jO... 



20 years increase.. 



World's Area 



in 

 Food Staples 



492,467,000 

 554 031 000 

 593,047,000 



Total Acres ! Acres 

 Add'd to Area C'nlrib'ted by 

 in Food St'pl's United Slates 



Percentivce 

 C'ntrib'ted by 

 United .States 



6I,564,000: 52.189,000 



39.016 000 29,945,000 



100,580,000, S2 134,000 



84.7 



77.0 

 81.7 



This and the preceding tables show that during the last twenty years the consum- 

 ing population has increased one-third faster than the products to be consumed but this 

 disproportionate increase has all occurred in the ninth decade (and the greater part of it 

 within the last five years), as in the eighth decade the increase in acreage was 12.5 per 

 cent, as against an increase in population of 11.4 per cent., while in the ninth the proper, 

 tions have been an increase of 14 per cent, iu the consuming element and but 7 per 

 cent, iu the area devoted to all food staples. 



Of the 100,580,000 acres added to the world's food producing area it is shown in the 

 last table that no less than 82,000,000, or nearly 82 per cent., must be credited to the United 

 States and during the 15 years ending with 1885 our additions were quite equal to the 

 entire added requirements of the world. Since 18S5, however, our additions to the area in 

 staple crops has been less than half that required to meet the increasing needs of our own 

 population, hence we have found it necessary to draw the needed supplies from the acreage 

 heretofore employed in producing food for exportation and the 21 ,00(1,000 acres so employed 

 in 1885 has now been reduced, by augmenting domestic needs, to 10,000,000 and as we shall 

 at no remote day. require the entire product of our fields, we may well ask when will 

 such conditions obtain, how will the world then fare for food and whence can Europe 

 hope to draw the needed supplies? 



In dealing with these problems bread-stufTs will, as in the commercial and agricult- 

 ural world, be treated as the controlling factor and for this purpose wheat and rye should 

 be considered as one. 



Of the two principal bread-making grains rye constitutes about 38 per cent, and en- 

 ters iu the proportion of 47 per cent, into the bread consumed iu Europe. 



The wheat area of the world, any part of the product of which finds its way into 

 the channels of commerce, has, during the last decade, produced crops averaging 2,1.36,- 

 000,000 bushels per annum, the average for the five years ending with 18S5 being 2,126,- 

 000,000 as against 2,145,000,000 bushels during the last five years, this increase of 19,000,000 

 bushels being in accord with an increase in area found to be less tha;; 2,000 000 acres 

 although in the meantime the added requirements of the added bread-eaters have been such 

 that the producing area, to have kept pace with such needs, should have increased not 

 less than 13,000,000 acres, and there was a small acreage deficit as early as 1SS5 and the re- 

 quirements are now such that an average yield, from every acre iu the world devoted to 

 wheat culture, would give a product fuU.v 100,000.000 bushels less than current needs, and 



