422 AGRICULTURAL APPROPRIATION BILL, 1924, 



time, and we feel that the results to the whole service will be very 

 beneficial. 



I have already mentioned the fact that since the amalgamation of 

 the bureau with crop reporting the machinery, the field men and the 

 volunteer correspondents, are now being used for other purposes as 

 well as crop reporting. We are not using the same people, but we 

 are building up lists of men who report only on special subjects 

 because we do not want to overburden our regular crop reporters. 



MARKETING STATISTICS. 



Doctor Taylor. Mr. Tenny will discuss the item relating to mar- 

 keting statistics. 



Mr. Texny. This is the item I mentioned 3^esterday as being 

 transferred from the marketing and distribution funds last year. 

 $23,400. This is used exclusivelv in the compilation of fundamental 

 marketing information. It includes holdings in cold storage; it 

 inchides me movement of cars from shipping points, and some price 

 information as to the various commodities. 



Mr. Anderson. Do you get figures yearly, weekly, or monthly 

 as to the loads and unloads of fruits and vegetables i 



Mr. Tenny. In the larger cities we get daily reports as to the 

 loads and unloads of fruits and vegetables. 



Mr. Anderson. That information, I imagine, gives 3'ou a fairly 

 good index? 



Mr. Tenny. Yes; it does. In addition to that we have cold- 

 storage reports on 35 commodities. To show the completeness of 

 these reports, we are circularizing monthl}^ 1,206 cold-storage plants. 



Mr. Anderson. Do you include public and private cold-storage 

 plants ? 



Mr. Tenny. Yes; 1,191 of the 1,206 are giving us replies monthly, 

 leaving only 15 out of 1,200 that fail to reply, so that we feel our 

 storage reports should be ver}'' nearly accurate. 



Mr. Anderson. Are these reports ever checked up? 



Mr. Tenny. Through personal visitation? 



Mr. Anderson. Yes. 



Mr. Tenny. Occasionally an individual one. but not universally 

 so. The man who has this in charge is right now making a visit to 

 six or eight of the larger cities for the puqjosc of getting in touch 

 with these cold storages and finding out how well their reports are 

 made. Of course, that does not mean that he goes into a storage 

 house and makes a count t)r gt)es through their books, but he is 

 en(k'av()ring to get the attitude of the peojile who are making the 

 re])orts, how they are making them an(l the data from which they 

 draw off tlie re]>orts. We are also making cold storage re])orts on 

 fish. One liundred and ten concerns are on the mailing list and the 

 average for the last six months has been 107 reports, leaving only 

 three that have failed to re])ort. 



We are making cold storage reports on apples, butter, cheese, ofi^f:^, 

 (ish, ice cream, lard, live stock, live-stock slaughters, cold storage 

 holdings of meats, coiuhMised and evaporated milk, oleomargarine, 

 and the cold stora<jc holdings of ponltrv, as well as (juarterly rejiorts 

 on wool. We arc handling a portion of the wool rej)orts, the remain- 

 <ler being handled by the Department of Commerce, and we are 



