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414 AGRICULTURAL APPITOPRIATIOX BILL, 1924. 



Division one of them in California will do considerable of this work 

 in California in addition to his work on the marketing end. 



Then a live-stock specialist has been put in Iowa, one in Illinois, 

 and a reorional live-stock specialist lias been stationed in Chicago, who 

 lias his ofKce with the marketing division. The live-stock reports 

 are to be cleared through the Chicago office to a large extent, where 

 they will be combined and fitted in with the marketing reports, so 

 that the whole project of reporthig on the markets, reporting on the 

 receipts of live stock at various stock yards, and the estimates which 

 this Division will make will be one and the same project. There will 

 be close co(»[)ci:iti()ii between all the lines of live-stock work, which, 

 we think, will improve the service. Then an arrangement has been 

 made with the Post Ofhce Department to make a semiannual pig survey. 

 One was made last spring which was very complete. The returns 

 from the 17 states in which we made the survey included about 10 

 per cent of the farms, and from the statistical standpoint a sample of 

 that size is abundantly large enough to give a picture of the whole: 

 in fact, we think the number of reports could probably be cut 

 down to o per cent, which would be much less expensive and still 

 obtain a very exact picture of the whole. At the present time an- 

 other survey is in progress, and we already have in about 200,000 

 schedules from all over the country. I noticed this morning that 

 something like fifteen or twenty thousand have come in from Iowa. 



Mr. Anderson. Are these schedules pretty accurate and do the 

 farmers make them out carefully i 



Mr. Cat.i.endek. They are made out for the most part by the 

 rural carrier himself; he asks the questions and fills in the answei-s, 

 just like a census enumerator. Those are the instructions, at least, 

 which go i)ut, and each carrier is instructed to pick a section out of 

 his route of 10 consecutive farms. He is instructed not to select his 

 farms, but to take every farm as it comes, regardless of size or owner- 

 ship, until he gets 10 reports. From these reports we hope to be 

 able to work out the ratios. For the first year the information is 

 not particularly valuable, because we have no comparisons that are 

 satisfactory; hut beginning with next spring's survey we will have 

 comparisons, and I feel that these pio; surveys are going to be of 

 great assistance in showing trends in liog production, and I think, 

 based on these surveys, it will be p()ssiV)le to forecast very accurately 

 and a o;o(k1 many months ahead what the supply of hogs for mar- 

 keting is going to be. 



I believe these estimates can be made very accurate, because we 

 have as a check the receipts at the stockyards as well as railroad 

 movements, and we are arranging now to get from frtie stockyards 

 and from independent packing plants which do not get their stock 

 throiigli tile yards direct the state of origin of all the stock coming to 

 tlu'ir plants, so that we will be able to forecast how many pigs Iowa, 

 for instance, will produce and check the forecasts from the actual 

 records of what go to market. Based on the surveys and checks we 

 will be able to forecast after this coming year, I think, how manv 

 pigs we may exjx'ct from any Stale during a season. I (loui)t if we 

 can estimate very closelv the number to be marketed in any one 

 nKMJth, hut for a season ( think we can forecast {|uite accurately. 



That covers what is being kV^wk^ on tin- pig survev. If continued, 

 I think it will jlcvelop into one of our most im|)ortant pieces of live- 

 stock reporting work. 



