ONION SUPPLY AND DISTRIBUTION. 119 



such holdings. It would seem that the local storage men might issue 

 these receipts to the growers whose onions are held in their warehouses. 



4. The holding of onions in storages is generally advisable, but to do 

 this with profit a knowledge of the available supply and general market 

 conditions is absolutely essential. 



5. To guide him in selling to the best advantage the grower should have 

 more exact information of market conditions and prices. At present 

 farmers sell more or less blindly. Newspapers, produce reports, market 

 bulletins and trade-papers help, but they are not sufficiently accurate 

 •or definite to be of much real assistance to the farmer. Price quotations 

 and market reports carefully compiled by State or Federal market bureaus 

 should be made available to all growers. 



But much of the advantage gained in this way will be lost to the farmers, 

 iDecause they cannot hope individually to learn everything about market- 

 ing and distribution. Moreover, a hundred farmers can hire a marketing 

 expert to handle their products by organizing themselves into a growers' 

 mutual marketing and purchasing agency, operated on a strictly co- 

 operative basis. 



The market demands of the producer dependable goods, packed uni- 

 formly and neatly, well graded and shipped regularly in sufficient quanti- 

 ties to meet the demand. These can hardly be met by the individual 

 farmer and because they cannot be met the retailer and consumer naturally 

 go to the various middlemen for their onions. Organization and co-opera- 

 tion among onion growers would help to solve many of the existing market- 

 ing problems. It would also assist in disposing of onions through the 

 auction route. 



6. The onion farmer should make more use of the various agencies 

 "which are in a position to assist him in an unprejudiced way to produce 

 and market his products. 



Some of the agencies are as follows : — 



(1) The Federal Office of Markets, Washington, D. C. This office 

 assisted the Texas growers in a very definite way during the season of 

 1915-16. About April 1, two men were stationed in Laredo and other 

 points in Texas to report the movement and distribution of car-lots of 

 onions. At the same time representatives were stationed in twenty or 

 more cities of the United States where onions are shipped largely, to report 

 the daily market conditions and prices. The information collected in 

 these cities was telegraphed each night to Laredo, where it was compiled 

 and distributed for the benefit of those interested. 



One function of the office is to assemble market information and make 

 it public in such a way that the distribution of the crop and the prevailing 

 market price can be known by any one. Each individual shipper can 

 guide his action accordingly^, without making known to any one else the 

 details of his business. 



Recently the department extended this service to include the onions 

 produced in the Connecticut Valley. Certainly, such information covering 



