328 ANNUAL. EEPORTS OF DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



More than 4,000,000 pieces of mail were handled by the Division 

 of Crop Reports during the year, as compared with 3,200,000 by 

 the same division for the preceding fiscal year, an increase of 25 

 per cent. About the same relative increase Avas noted in all other 

 branches of the bureau at Washington. 



In the State offices of field agents the work more than doubled in 

 the fiscal year 1919 as compared with the preceding year. The 

 issuance by field agents of monthly State crop reports bearing their 

 names w^hich are generally reproduced in all the State papers has 

 made them widely known throughout their States and has resulted 

 in a heavy volume of correspondence. Many of the field agents 

 are becoming more and more recognized among business men and 



Fig. 1. The shading indicates States cooperating under formal agreements with the 

 Federal Bureau of Crop Estimates in the collection and dissemination of monthly 

 estimates relating to crops and live stock. 



Cooperative agreements are under consideration in several States not shaded in 

 the above map, and partial cooperation exists in some others as a result of mutual 

 interest. 



officials of the State governments and State institutions as the best 

 authorities on the statistics of agriculture in their States, so that 

 the practice is growing of referring correspondence calling for 

 statistical information to the field agent of the Bureau of Crop 

 Estimates. A considerable number of requests for information re- 

 garding localized production wdthin a State, such as special crops 

 or county estimates, are regularly referred by the Washington office 

 of the bureau to the State offices of field agents. The steadily increas- 

 ing demand for detailed information which can be furnished only 

 by the State field agents indicates the need for j)roviding them with 

 adequate office space, equipment, and clerical assistance. 



COOPERATION WITH STATE DEPARTMENTS OF AGRICULTURE. 



During the fiscal year just closed cooperative agreements were 

 entered into between the Bureau of Crop Estimates and the State 



